The Artificer of Zero
by Hurricane's Quill
Summary: Louise Francoise Leblanc de Valliere wanted a Familiar strong enough to finally shut up all the people who called her Louise the Zero. What she got was a snarky, happy-go-lucky Magic: the Gathering player. But when her Familiar starts showing off powerful magic, it may unlocks secrets about herself that even she couldn't have ever dreamed of.
1. The Artificer of Zero, Lloyd Kreis

**Turn 01: The Artificer of Zero, Lloyd Kreis**

"Who are you?!"

Lloyd Kreis had no immediate answer for the pinkette before him, instead trying to figure out where he was, because it was certainly different from the place he'd been in before. He was in some kind of grassy plain, surrounded by people who looked like they should be attending Hogwarts, what with their black robes and all. Some of them appeared to have creatures with them as well. And all of them were staring, intrigued, at Lloyd.

"Answer the question, commoner!" the pinkette continued, glaring at him. She was fairly small, all things considered, with a petite build and holding a small wooden stick in her hand that looked suspiciously like a wand. "What are you doing here!?"

"Commoner…?" Lloyd asked, blinking owlishly. _Who still uses that word anymore?_ "My name is Lloyd Kreis. Who in the bluish flaming hell are you?"

The reply probably would've earned some kind of angry or snappy remark, but strangely, the girl recoiled, a look of dawning realization and horror appearing on her face. "No…don't tell me-!" This apparently got quite a kick out of the audience, as most of them were now laughing.

"As expected from Louise the Zero!"

"She summoned a commoner as a Familiar! How does such failure exist!?"

"Oh, my sides!"

Lloyd was now more confused than ever, and his interrogator even angrier. "Sh-shut up!" the girl said, turning to someone behind Lloyd. "This is a mistake! Professor Colbert, please let me try again!"

Looking behind him, Lloyd saw that there was an older man, balding and bespectacled and carrying a long staff, but clad in the same robes as everyone else. He simply shook his head. "You know I can't let you do that. The Summoning Ritual is sacred and any attempt to redo the spell would be an insult to the ceremony itself. It's been decided this commoner, if he is one, is to be your Familiar Spirit. You'll have to take him."

"I must say, this makes everything you said earlier worth it!" a tanned woman with dark red hair said. The front of her blouse was opened to create a neckline to expose her quite ample bosom. "Summoning a commoner only just proves your own lack of skill!"

The pinkette looked ready to start mauling her right then and there. "You shut up, Kirche! I'll show you, I can fix this!"

"Louise, there is no 'fixing' this, as you say. Lloyd is to be your Familiar, and that is that," Professor Colbert repeated, silencing further conversation. "Now, complete the Ritual."

Louise, finally defeated, turned her attention back to Lloyd, her face somewhere seething rage and complete devastation. Taking the wand in her hand, which sparked at the tip, she tapped Lloyd on the forehead and spoke again. " _Pentagon of the five elements, grant your blessing on this creature and bind it as my familiar._ " She then grabbed Lloyd by the chin and kissed him, squarely upon the lips.

Once they separated, Lloyd wiped his mouth on his arm, trying to clear out the taste on his tongue. While the sensation was actually pretty good, the surprise had caught him off guard and the taste of her was a little unpleasant. "I'm flattered, miss, but what was that for?"

"It was for the ritual! Don't you know anything?" Louise snapped angrily at him. "I can't believe I wasted my first kiss on you!"

"Feeling's mutual," Lloyd countered dryly as he got to his feet. "You're a horrible kisser."

The class roared with laughter again.

"This one's got some lip on him!"

"Yet another thing Louise the Zero fails at!"

"Even he hates her! I like this commoner!"

Louise's response was to sock him right on the chest. Admittedly, it wasn't a wrong response to the back-sass, but it still felt like getting punched with a steel ball. As Lloyd massaged his sternum, he noticed that there was now something being etched into his hand. They looked a lot like Nordic runes, but he couldn't make heads or tails of it. Professor Colbert noticed the runes as well and leaned into observe them closer. "Ah, your Familiar Runes…I don't think I've seen runes like these before. It must be for a specific contract. I'll make a note of them and see if I can find out more."

"Uh…right. Thanks," Lloyd said, still having no real idea what the hell was going on.

"That concludes the ceremony, everyone! There's no classes tomorrow so you and your Familiar can get to know each other. Class dismissed!"

The magical words that any student wanted to hear apparently still had the same effect here, as many of them went off on their own way and mingled with their friends. Of course, this left Lloyd alone with Louise, and it was clear that the young girl next to him (and apparently one that he towered over) was still quite furious over her perceived failure. Then, much to Lloyd's shock, many of the students suddenly took off into the air and flew off into the distance. They didn't appear to have anything that allowed them to fly, and had only heard something sounded a lot like French.

"Close your mouth, you're going to attract flies!" Louise snapped at him. Lloyd glared at Louise, but complied.

"My, my, Louise. You have summoned quite the Familiar," the one Louise identified as Kirche said, coming over. She was actually quite attractive now that Lloyd could see her properly, and Kirche, noticing where Lloyd's eyes were going, actually leaned in to stare into his eyes, a smoky look in her eyes. But Lloyd could tell she was, in reality, giving him an opportunity to stare down her blouse's neckline.

"Kirche, you listen here!" Louise snapped, playing killjoy. "I don't need you to-"

"Do what?" asked Kirche. "I'm not doing anything to him…yet." She leaned in to whisper in Lloyd's ear, "I'll be sure to greet you properly later." She then went off to be with her compatriot, a bookish girl with blue hair and glasses, and took off into the air with the rest, with her friend not far behind. And behind them, a large blue dragon.

Louise grumbled something snide, then pulled on Lloyd's shirt to lead him on. "Come, Familiar! We're going back as well!"

"Going? Where?" asked Lloyd.

"The academy! Now follow me!"

"Geez, relax, will ya, I'm coming…" Lloyd said, following Louise on the ground, but when he tried to walk alongside, she shoved him backward. Not much longer after that, they apparently arrived at their destination. It was a castle, torn right from the pages of history, with white walls and towers to protect the keep. However, behind the castle that garnered even more of Lloyd's attention was the suns. Yes, suns. Plural.

"…am I alive? Am I in Dominaria? I'm so confused right now…!" Lloyd said, looking around.

Louise apparently decided to take pity on him and explain in her own way. "This is the Tristain Academy, here in the Kingdom of Tristain in Halgekinia. Now keep up, and don't get lost!" As Louise led the way through the halls, he was fairly surprised how many other teenagers were in attendance. Even more interesting was that apparently there was a maid staff on call, carrying laundry, trays of food, and cleaning supplies. The more he saw, the more he was starting to pick up the aristocratic tendencies in the school, which would explain the commoner part from before. Speaking of which…

"This is the worst day ever…" Louise groaned, flopping onto her bed in her room. "I was supposed to summon a magnificent familiar to show up everyone who called me Louise the Zero, and instead I summon some lousy commoner…"

"Again with the commoner thing…?" Lloyd grunted, entering the room and closing the door behind them. "Look, I don't know where you get off calling me a commoner, but I do have a name and I want to be called it. It can't be that hard, right?"

"I am a noble, you ingrate of a Familiar! I will call you whatever I want and that will be that!" Louise snapped at him. "Now make yourself useful and bring me some tea."

"First, how? Second, why?" Lloyd said, glaring at his pink-haired captor. "You don't get to kidnap from me from my own house, make me into your 'familiar' or whatever, and then order me around like I'm your personal gopher!"

"Kidnapped you? I am your master, I summoned you here with magic!" Louise countered. "You should be honored to be in service to a noble!"

"Like hell I'm honored to serve my captor! Plus, you just admitted to bringing me here against my will! That's textbook kidnapping!"

"Why you…! Clearly they didn't teach you manners where you're from!"

"My manners are fine! I'm just not using them for you! You don't deserve that respect from me!"

"Respect!?" Louise screeched. Finally having had enough of Lloyd's lip, she got to her feet and whipped out her wand. "I'll teach you about respect! Know your place, Familiar!"

The wand came down, and the resultant explosion sent Lloyd flying into the wall, knocked unconscious by the magical blast.

* * *

When Lloyd came around, it was the middle of the night and Louise had already fallen asleep. His body seemed to have recovered from being knocked backward by whatever force was in that explosion, but his muscles were still aching, his ears were still ringing slightly, and his mouth tasted like iron. Clutching his aching head, Lloyd made his way to his feet and stumbled towards the door, hoping to get some fresh air.

And when he stepped outside to look up at the stars from a nearby window, he saw two moons hanging in the sky. Yup. He was officially no longer home. Continuing down the stairs to the next floor, he quickly stumbled back when he saw two people talking in the hall. One of them was a young blonde boy around Louise's age, wearing a ruffled shirt, talking with a girl in a brown robe to contrast with the boy's black one.

"You know, I've been told I'm really good at baking soufflés," the girl was saying.

"Well, I'd love to sample one of those sometimes," the boy replied, practically oozing charm out of his skin.

"You really mean it?"

"Of course, Katie. I would never lie to you."

"Oh, Lord Guiche…" the girl sighed, now practically putty in his hand.

As Guiche continued to put the moves on Katie, Lloyd took the opportunity to sneak past them and down the opposite stairs, but Guiche happened to spot him on his way out. "Hold it right there, you!" Lloyd froze, cursing under his breath at his failed escape. "A commoner Familiar causing trouble for a noble, and not even so much as a word of thanks?"

"Uh, sure, whatever. Thanks for your time, now I'm afraid I really must dash, so…ta-ta," Lloyd said, taking a bow and quickly making his way down the stairs. "Stuck-up Casanova…"

Guiche grinned, putting his arm around Katie. "You'll have to excuse him. He's a restless fellow."

* * *

Lloyd finally made it to ground level, where a great big fountain was apparently in the middle of the room, where two more people were apparently also meeting for a midnight rendezvous. One of them Lloyd recognized as Kirche, the redhead he'd met earlier, and some other guy.

"It's a dream that I could be together with you like this, Kirche the Fever…"

"And tonight won't be ending with just a fever…"

Lloyd mentally groaned. This wasn't just a school for nobles, it was also a high school with more out-of-control animal instinct than Yavimaya on Valentine's Day! With the two of them focused on each other (and really not wanting to stick around for what could come next), Lloyd tried to sneak past them, but he could tell he'd gotten their attention as well. "Oh for the love of God…" And thusly he ran out of the room.

"Hey, who was that?"

"That was the Familiar Louise the Zero summoned, I think…"

* * *

Lloyd finally made it outside, taking a moment to flop into the grass. He willed himself not to burst into tears from the strain. He'd gotten through tougher than this in the past. At least, as far as Magic went. But this was real life, and unless he discovered some answers that he could understand from someone that wouldn't try to blow him up over trifles, he was just about ready to call this place Hell.

"Ugh…what did I do to deserve this? Getting roped out of my house to serve some trigger-happy noble with a chip on her shoulder! What am I supposed to do? How do I survive with only one set of clothes and a deck of cards! Or a towel! Don't you need a towel for this sort of thing!? Gah…!"

Lloyd felt something poking into his side. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his deck case, which was now the only thing of home he had on him. He opened it, staring at the card on the bottom, Gold Myr, and held it close to his chest, trying to find familiarity in the feel of the deck in his hands. It didn't really help.

Suddenly, something began to glow in the cards between his hands. The Gold Myr against his palms suddenly wiggled free of its brothers and moved over to the side on its own, and suddenly transformed. Now in the place of the card was a small gold-plated droid about two and a half feet tall, with three-fingered hands and ovoid, almost avian-like heads. It gave an electrical squeak, as if awaiting a command for him.

The thing was, what it got was totally something else as a reply.

"OH MY GOOOOOD!"

* * *

Louise was furious with herself. She wasn't expecting her Familiar to wander off in the middle of the night! At least it forgot to close the door behind it, otherwise she'd never would've known and it'd be halfway to Germania by now. Thankfully, she'd managed to catch Guiche on her way down and got him to help. Unfortunately, thanks to Guiche, Kirche had abandoned her lover for the night and was now also present.

Making it outside, she saw the oncoming figure of Lloyd, looking rather happy for some unknown reason, and whistling some kind of jaunty tune. But then it was replaced by loud screaming as Guiche proceeded to snatch him off the ground with a levitation spell. "What the hell!? Hey! Who's doing this!? Put me down!"

"Oh, hush you," Guiche commented from the ground. "This is the second time I've had to keep you afloat."

"What does that even mean!? Though if you want to answer that, put me down fi-i-i-i-i-rst-!" Lloyd fired back as Guiche used his wand to swing Lloyd back and forth up in the air.

"This is hilarious! I don't think any Familiar has ever tried to escape his Master!" Kirche said around her giggles.

Guiche finally stopped swinging Lloyd around in the air, and from his position, Lloyd saw something else that continued to challenge his perceptions. Hanging in the air were two moons, one pink and one blue. Hank Green wasn't kidding when he said the universe was weird, but this? "Two suns and now two moons? HOW IS THIS PLANET NOT EXTRA CRISPY!?"

Louise finally had had enough, mostly because she just wanted to stop Kirche teasing her and get her Familiar back so she could go back to sleep. "Guiche, put him down."

Guiche obeyed, lowering his rose. Lloyd finally came down to earth, although the landing was a little hard. "Well then, if nothing else, I'll be returning to my room. Do not hesitate to call upon my services again." With that, Guiche left, leaving Lloyd to glare at his retreating back.

 _We'll be seeing each other again real soon, jackass…_

* * *

Having recaptured her Familiar, the first thing she did was put a chain on his neck to make sure he didn't run anymore. For a commoner that was almost twice her size, he really didn't put up much of a fight, although he had been complaining of something called "vertigo" thanks to Guiche's levitation spell. He then promptly fell against the wall and took a nap once they got back to her room, which was all the opportunity she needed to snap the chains on before he woke up a few minutes later.

"So you say you're from a place called Earth?"

"Yup," Lloyd replied. "I was on my way to school in Hemet, California, I saw this green thing hanging out in the middle of open space, and when I touched it swallowed me and the next thing I know I'm getting yelled at by you in a place with two suns and two moons."

"Well, I don't believe it," said Louise flatly. "I don't believe that such a world exists."

"Then where the heck do you think you pulled me from? 'cause it's friggin' obvious I'm not local! Look, just send me back and we can both sleep this off like a really bad hangover."

"I can't."

"You could at least try!" Lloyd snapped, but then something fell on his face: Louise's cloak.

"It's not that simple, commoner. Once the Ritual is complete, it's absolute. There's no way I could send you home even if I wanted to," Louise said, proceeding to unbutton her blouse and take off her skirt, throwing them in Lloyd's face with her cloak.

"The hell was that for?" Lloyd asked, pulling them off his head as Louise then took off the undershirt she had underneath, much to his shock. "Good God, cover yourself! Or at least turn around, will ya!?"

"Why?" Louise asked, completely unfazed by her Familiar's sudden reaction.

"I'm a guy! Why on earth are you so cavalier about undressing in front of one?"

"You're just a Familiar," Louise said calmly, throwing her undershirt at Lloyd. "It's no different than undressing in front of a dog." Then, next came her panties, which sparked an even bigger reaction as he squawked embarrassedly, pulled it off with just a finger, and threw it away with the rest of her clothes as though it were covered in sewage. "I want those washed when I wake up."

"You want me to what? How am I supposed to do anything while I'm chained to the friggin' wall!?" Lloyd asked indignantly. "Screw your laundry!"

"Who do you expect will be feeding you?" Louise countered idly as she put on a nightgown and slid into bed. "Look, you're my Familiar. You're expected to be doing this kind of stuff for me. If you don't cause any trouble and do what you're told, I'll be sure to feed you, okay?"

"Well, don't I feel special," frowned Lloyd. A reply was not forthcoming, though, as Louise had fallen asleep. As he stared at the pile of Louis clothes, he tried to think of a solution to his predicament. There was no way he'd be able to do this without attempting to rip the chains out, and that was just not gonna happen. If he could get someone to help him –

A thought, so completely out of the blue and yet somehow completely doable, suddenly struck him. If he wasn't dreaming and he did summon that Gold Myr somehow…He quickly fished out his deck, pulling three cards off the top: Palladium Myr, Iron Myr, and Shimmer Myr. As the cards suddenly began to glow in his hand, Lloyd smirked.

Maybe this Familiar business wasn't so impossible after all.

* * *

The next morning, Louise woke up to find her Familiar having a whispered conversation with something she couldn't see. As she sat up, Lloyd quickly did an about-face, a bright glimmer of light coming out of his back (or was it just something behind him?) for just a second. "Good morning, dear Master!"

"Muh…oh, the Familiar," she mumbled blearily.

"Here you are. Fresh clothes, as expected," said Lloyd, holding out neatly-folded laundry.

Louise was fairly impressed, considering the circumstances, but there was something clearly missing. "Where are my panties?" Lloyd made a grunting noise that sounded like "check inside," and she found them, also folded, between her blouse and skirt. She was starting to become a bit confused. Did something happen overnight? Because last night they were barely on speaking terms, and now he seemed to be perfectly happy.

"Okay, I got your laundry. Now can you get this chain off of me?"

"No," Louise said bluntly.

"Look, even if I did run, where would I go? I figure I got a better chance of figuring out what really happened if I hang around here, anyway," Lloyd replied, although he promptly turned away with a squeak as Louise started getting dressed.

"Okay, fine! Now shut up and dress me!"

Lloyd stiffened, and his voice went deathly flat. "You have _got_ to be kidding."

"The nobility never dress themselves!"

"Aw, muffin," Lloyd's voice started dripping with sarcasm. "Some of us have to dress ourselves everyday. At least show me you can take care of yourself."

"Then you'll go without breakfast and stay chained to the wall."

Lloyd opened his mouth, then closed it, then sighed in defeat. "Days like this make me wish I stayed in bed."

* * *

After unchaining Lloyd, the unlikely duo made their way back down to breakfast. Lloyd's initial enthusiasm had already waned, but there was just something about Louise that made her actually quite pretty to his eyes. She was a petite girl with pink hair and pink eyes, and when she wasn't speaking the way she carried herself seemed to give a kind of noble air, but a kinder one than when she wasn't attempting to blow him up with her magic.

They did seem to make an interesting duo, with her in her school uniform and shorter than the average student of her class, whereas Lloyd seemed to tower over everyone and stood out with his AC*DC "For Those About to Rock" shirt, jeans, and gray striped hoodie with black synthetic fur on the inside, and when they entered the great hall, more than a few people were whispering already, throwing out speculations and guesses about what was really happening between them both.

Of course, Lloyd was more focused on the table than what was going around it.

"Damn, man!" he said, looking at the spread in front of him. It appeared breakfast was some kind of hotcake with soup on the side, and he spotted fresh slices of fruit a little farther off. "Is this an honors school? You guys live like friggin' kings!"

"Of course we do," Louise said airily. "Now be considerate pull out the chair for me."

Lloyd complied, grumbling something about manners, but as he went for the empty seat next to her, she smacked his hand off the chair and pointed down at the ground, where a single lonely plate next to where she was sitting. Clearly, this was where he was supposed to be in all this. And for Lloyd, that was the last straw. "Screw this! I'm gonna go find food on my own!"

"You get back here!" Louise snapped at him, grabbing the back of his hoodie.

Lloyd yanked it right back out of her hand. "Or what? You'll chain me to the wall again? You'd better be wearing some pretty tight leather if you want to run that trick again! Then again, I don't think it'd actually work, because your nickname must also mean zero sex appeal!"

Apparently the entire hall had heard that one, because the entire student body started roaring with laughter. Louise went deathly pale, trying to hide her face in her hands as Lloyd spun on his heel and left through the opposite doors.

* * *

Ten minutes later, Lloyd was even more hungry before and he was pretty sure he was lost. It did feel good to finally get away from that pink-haired she-devil, but without her he had no idea where he had to go, and the maids were all too busy with their own work that he didn't want to bother them. It didn't help that he was already starting to feel a little guilty with his snapping at Louise earlier.

"Um…excuse me…aren't you Miss Valiere's Familiar?"

The speaker was a maid, a little taller than Louise, with black hair in a short pageboy-style haircut and, much to his surprise, Asian facial features. It took Lloyd everything he had to not ask her if she was from Earth as well, and instead answered her question. "I might be. How did you know?"

"News travels fast around the school," she said. Already Lloyd was starting to like this girl. Her sweet-sounding voice was definitely a nice change compared to Louise's sharp voice. "Nobody was expecting someone to summon a commoner as a Familiar."

"Well, congrats, you figured me out," Lloyd said. "Lloyd Kreis is the name."

"My name is Siesta," the girl said. "It's nice to meet you, finally." Lloyd nodded in agreement, but his stomach decided to make itself known. Siesta tilted her head. "Didn't Miss Valiere feed you? It's the Master's responsibility to care for their Familiars."

"No, unfortunately," Lloyd scratched the back of his head. "We kinda had a parting of the ways in view of the whole school, so I'm kinda on my own for breakfast."

"Oh, no!" Siesta looked absolutely scandalized at the very notion of Lloyd not being fed, almost like he'd just said Louise was taking a lit match to a cat's tail. She quickly clenched her hands under her chin for a moment for a moment, then took him by the hand. "That's not right at all! Please, come with me, I'll get you a nice meal!"

"Now you're talking my language!" Lloyd grinned, following Siesta down the hall.

In the kitchen, Lloyd was treated to a breakfast of fresh buns, a bowl of stew, and a glass of fruit juice. Despite being fairly basic, it was incredibly delicious. As he ate, Siesta was also happy enough to give him the information that he'd been looking for since he came here. The world, which was referred to as Halgekinia, was a place where magic was the common practice, instead of technology. However, the number of people who could actually use magic were actually fewer than one would expect, and usually they came from noble families. As a result, the nobles tended to look down on the magic-less commoners, so there was a clear rift between the two groups.

"So that's why you freaked out when I told you Louise and I had a falling out?" Lloyd asked around a mouthful of bun. "Suddenly, it makes a lot of sense."

"Yes. You must have a lot of courage to stand up for yourself!" Siesta nodded, but her smile soon faded into a look of fear. "But if you anger her too much, it could bring down horrible consequences. A commoner just can't stand up to the nobility."

"Fair enough," Lloyd said as he took a gulp of juice. "Then again, I come from a country that was built on that very principle, so what'cha gonna do?" Siesta's eyes widened, unable to conceive the very notion of it in her mind. Lloyd chuckled as he quickly put his dishes in a small pile. "But that's a story for another time. Do you need help with anything? I feel kinda bad for freeloading like this."

"Really?" Siesta blinked. This Familiar was something else, especially compared to the usual type of person that typically called the Academy home. When Lloyd nodded, she beamed like the sun. "Then could you help me deliver the cakes for dessert? Most of the other servants have their hands full already and it would take me a while to do it myself."

"No problem. Just show me what I'm supposed to do," Lloyd smiled back.

* * *

After showing where the boxed desserts were and the trolleys they were to be delivered on, Siesta took point as they went outside to where a bunch of students were sitting out on café tables. Finally, he had a real sense of the school and what it was all about, and unfortunately, Siesta's explanation about nobility from earlier was absolutely spot-on. The gathered students were either still eating lunch, talking about their studies, or bragging about their family and their exploits for the crown. Lloyd's high school wasn't all that much different, except for the bragging part, but if he didn't know any better, he'd think he was still in a regular school. Of course, that promptly went out the window as a couple of students poring over tomes were practicing minor spells at the table. But despite the ruckus from earlier, nobody really seemed to give him a second glance as he placed their cakes on the table.

"Well hello, Louise's Familiar."

The redhead from the day before, Kirche, was giving him the "come hither" gesture with that smoky look in her eyes. She was joined by what Lloyd guessed was her Familiar, a bright red frilled lizard with steam coming out of its mouth. Her blue-haired friend was sitting across from her, her nose in a book and her big blue dragon curled around her seat. Lloyd quickly looked down at his trolley, and son of a gun, there were two cakes, one of which with Kirche's name and the other for someone named Tabitha, probably the bluenette.

"Where is Louise?" Kirche asked as Lloyd came over. "This is the day we and our Familiars are supposed to get acquainted. Did she send you ahead to find a table?"

Lloyd shrugged. "I haven't seen her since our spat at breakfast. Truth be told, I kinda want to be as far away from Louise as possible right now."

"So wait, that wasn't an act?" Kirche blinked, surprised. "How strange. A Familiar and their master should get along splendidly. Take me and Flame, we've only been together for a day and we're nigh inseparable." Flame promptly made a "nyuk-nyuk-nyuk" sound as Kirche stroked the lizard's ridges on its head.

"We'd been sniping at each other since we got together last night," Lloyd sighed as he placed their cakes on the table. "Breakfast was just me reaching the end of my tether. I may be a Familiar, but I have my pride, too. If she won't respect that, then I'm in no mood to work with her."

"Point," Tabitha piped up from her book.

"Well, I guess Tabitha's right, there. Honestly, if I was in your position I wouldn't be so tolerant, either," Kirche said. "But, I guess it's to be expected of Louise the Zero."

"You know, I kept hearing that all yesterday. You want to tell me what this 'Louise the Zero' thing is all about? Because I'm pretty sure my guess from earlier wasn't even close."

"Well, yes, but then again, it's hard not to think of her that way," Kirche replied as she leaned forward ever so slightly just to show off her breasts. "You see, magic is divided into five elements: fire, water, earth, wind, and void, though that element's been lost to time and nobody we know can cast it. All magicians can practice one of these elements. I, for example, practice fire magic. But Louise appears to be unable to cast any of these. Any time she casts a spell, she just creates an explosion and fails."

"Muh…?" Lloyd, having been hypnotized by Kirche's seduction, suddenly snapped back to reality and cleared his throat to hide his embarrassment. "So you're saying all she can do is create explosions? But she summoned me, right? I would think if the spell she used to summon me here failed, then she'd just make another explosion. Why am I here, then? Doesn't that mean she succeeded for once?"

"Correct." Tabitha said.

"Say wot?"

"Tabitha means you're actually not that far off the mark. As far as we can tell, the ritual was a success. All she ended up doing was pulling you from wherever you came from," Kirche explained, licking her lips and playing with the ends of one lock of red hair. "This makes you the biggest talking point in the school right now, and I would certainly love to learn more…"

Lloyd quickly went back to the trolley, trying to hide his rapidly-reddening cheeks. "We'll see. But right now, I'd better get back to work. Thanks for the info." While he couldn't get away from Kirche fast enough, once he was out of earshot he shook his head, hoping to clear whatever dank thoughts had been accruing since their conversation started. Kirche wasn't exactly his type of girl he'd like to date, but be damned if she couldn't put the moves on him. As he walked, by, however, another conversation caught his ears.

"What's wrong with Louise? She barely touched breakfast and then just went back to her room."

"Her Familiar shouted at her before breakfast and stormed off. A couple of the maids were talking about how she's been crying in her room all morning."

"Guess she finally got what was coming to her. She may be a child of the Valliere family but she's still just a zero in the end…"

Lloyd moved a little faster, guilt replacing the arousal he'd chased away. As much as snapping at Louise felt good when he did it, and did allow him a degree of freedom he hadn't had since coming here, it wasn't totally justified. Plus, now that he knew that she actually did cast a spell right, it was clear she wasn't a _complete_ zero, and more importantly, completely misunderstood. Maybe once he was done with helping Siesta, he'd go back to her and try to make amends.

"Is my cake ready yet?"

Lloyd could recognize that voice anywhere. Sure enough, that blonde playboy Guiche was also at a table, with a blonde girl he didn't recognize before. Remembering that Katie girl from the night before, a sudden idea flickered into Lloyd's mind, and he grinned. _Hello, opportunity. I've been expecting you._ Siesta was in the middle of going back to her trolley, and immediately Lloyd intercepted her. "Tell you what, Siesta, why don't we switch? I'll handle this guy for you."

"But that's…"

"Don't worry about it. I've got a bone to pick with this guy, anyhow," Lloyd insisted. Siesta acquiesced, passing the plate to him. Now armed with cake, he was ready to put this guy in his place. "Cake for you, sir."

"Ah, bring me seconds on tea as well," Guiche said, not aware of Lloyd's presence. "Your Familiar really resembles you in how cute it is, Montmorency," he said to his female guest.

"You flatter me like always. But recently, I heard a rumor that you've started dating a first year," the woman said, to which Lloyd saw Guiche flinch at oh-so-slightly.

"Nonsense! There's never a-"

"Hidden side in my affection for you," Lloyd finished, in what he thought was a good mimicry of Guiche.

"Wh-what are you saying?" Guiche said, already backpedaling.

"Well, correct me if I'm wrong, but everybody seems to be wearing different cloaks. You and your friend are wearing black cloaks, so I assume that means you're in the same class year. But that girl I saw you with last night, she had a brown cloak. Tell me, is brown the color of a first year?"

"What is he talking about, Guiche?" Montmorency asked suspiciously.

"Get back to your work, pageboy!" Guiche snapped at Lloyd, standing up to feign righteous indignation.

"What, you don't recognize me from last night? I'm hurt, Guiche," Lloyd smirked. "Anyway, thanks for last night, dude. I'll be seeing you around." With that, Lloyd turned around and made his way back to Siesta's trolley, waiting for the fireworks to start.

"Guiche, what is this about!?"

"U-uh, you remember what I said, right? That peasant Familiar is a restless fellow, that's all…"

"Lord Guiche…where is he?"

Just as Lloyd was about to go and carry on with what he was doing, the Katie girl that Guiche had been schmoozing the night before also arrived with a basket. There was no way Lloyd was going to pass this up now. "Lord Guiche is over there," he said to her, jerking with his head. "I've been told he's been expecting you."

Katie immediately followed his direction as Lloyd resisted the urge to cackle insanely. The trap was set, and the fuse on this bomb was getting dangerously short. "Lord Guiche, I've been looking for you. I thought I'd bring the soufflé that I was talking about last night…"

Guiche immediately dropped Montmorency like a forgotten sack of potatoes. "K-katie! Hello!"

"Last night…?" Montmorency was starting to get quite angry now.

"Man, you're so lucky," Lloyd said, adding more fuel to what was soon to be Guiche's funeral pyre. "You did say you'd love to have a taste of that soufflé last night, yes?"

"What are you talking about, peasant?! You're making these ladies get the wrong idea!" Guiche snapped at him.

"Wrong idea? You're the one double-dipping, I'm just standing here enjoying the show!" Lloyd said innocently.

"So you DID lay your fingers on this first year!"

"You're horrible! You said I'm the only one!"

"A-anyway, both of you calm down…" Guiche pleaded.

"LIAR!"

SMACK.

Guiche fell to the ground, his face now sporting two bright red hand marks.

Katie and Montmorency both left the table in a huff. Well, Montmorency did, anyway, Katie looked like she was about to cry.

Lloyd pumped his fist. Mission accomplished.

"And that's my good deed for the day. I'll be here all week, ladies and gentlemen," Lloyd immediately went back to pushing his trolley, rapping to himself as he went on his way. " _Chiggity-check yourself before you wreck yourself, check yourself before you wreck yourself, check yourself before you wreck yourself, 'cause shotgun bullets are bad for your health…_ "

"You there…" Lloyd suddenly froze against his will, a feeling he was familiar with. Guiche had gotten to his feet, and with rose in hand started to make his way over to him. "I hope you are prepared for the consequences of your actions here today. You've spoken out of turn to an aristocrat, engaged in slander, and made two innocent women cry. I expect a full apology out of you."

"Call me less of a man if you like," Lloyd said, turning his head towards Guiche. His voice was low, almost that same deathly flat he'd pulled on Louise earlier. "But playing with the hearts of two women to satisfy your own ego makes you less of a man, too. Have you no shame at all?"

The students in the area oohed, sensing violence coming in a hurry. Guiche flicked his rose, sneering behind its petals. "Such impudence! If you won't respond to words, then perhaps a sound beating will. I challenge you to a duel!" he said, pointing his rose at him.

Lloyd turned around, putting his hand on his deck case to make sure it was still there. This guy thought he was just another commoner? Well, he was going to figure out the hard way he was anything _but_ another commoner. "A duel, you say? I'm down with that. Name your time and place."

"NOOOO!" Siesta suddenly came barreling out of nowhere, trying to drag him away from Guiche. "Lloyd, you can't! There's no way a peasant can duel a noble! If you just apologize now, maybe he'll let you go!"

Guiche actually considered it. "Well, I am feeling rather generous. You have only been here two days, after all. If you apologize right now, I'll call the whole thing off and even forgive you."

Lloyd was now running red-hot. This spoiled snot wanted to throw the blame on him for getting something he brought on himself? Plus, he had a good feeling his act of "mercy" was nothing less than an attempt to save face and maybe get in the good graces of Siesta, who was also quite pretty, all things considered. But it was that tone of voice, that oily feeling of pure sleaze, that really set him off. And to quote a certain red-clad hero, "Daddy needs to express some rage."

"If you won't accept your bad karma, then I'll shove it right down your throat, if that's what it takes," Lloyd replied. "If you want blood, Guiche, you got it." The gathered students gasped, and Siesta was about to have another freak-out. "Now, I say again. Name your time and place."

"We will duel one hour hence, in Vestri Court."

"Bring it on."

Guiche merely shrugged and walked away, letting the students talk animatedly about the upcoming fight. Lloyd exhaled, trying to calm himself down, but Siesta…

"You'll be killed!" Siesta was already starting to cry. "Why would you do that? You'll be torn apart against Guiche!"

"Hey hey hey hey!" Lloyd said, trying to calm down the maid. "Siesta, listen to me. I can win this!" He put his hand on her head, trying to calm her down. "Besides. Unbeknownst to Guiche," Lloyd pulled out his deck case from his hoodie pocket, shaking it at her. "I've got an Induraga Mano in my back pocket."

Siesta looked up, her eyes still welling up with tears, but she seemed less distraught and more confused. "Indura-what?"

* * *

Louise had finally managed to calm down, washing her face to take out the tear tracks. Her Familiar was going to pay for making a fool of her, in front of the whole school, no less! After she'd stopped crying, she was already going through various ideas she had to punish the accursed Familiar. She was the Master, she was the one who called the shots, and after starving him for a couple of days she was certain he would _never_ forget it.

That's when she heard it.

"Did you hear? Guiche challenged Louise's Familiar to a duel and he accepted it!"

"Everyone's already headed for Vestri Court! If he lasts more than five minutes against Guiche he might actually have some merit as a Familiar!"

"THAT IDIOT!" Louise screamed, quickly picking up her pace. Guiche was only a Dot Class Mage, but a Familiar with no magic was going to get killed going up against him in a duel! She was going to have to hurry to make sure she saved her Familiar. And then punish him.

* * *

Siesta led Lloyd to Vestri Court, and already they were attracting quite the audience. Guiche was already waiting for them one side of the area. Poor Siesta was still so terrified for her new friend's safety that she had insisted on holding his hand the entire way, as if he was being taken to the gallows, and her grip was like a vice. Kirche and Tabitha were also watching from the nearby wall, away from most of the other gathered students.

"I respect you, commoner, for actually showing up. You are as brave as you are stupid," Guiche commented airily.

"Uh, thanks, I guess," grunted Lloyd, finally extricating himself from Siesta's grasp. "Though if you were worried I'd be running for the hills, you needn't have bothered. I wouldn't miss kicking your ass for the world."

"Wait!" The group groaned as Louise fought her way through the crowd. "Stop this, Guiche! You know duels are forbidden!"

"Well yes, but only if they're duels between nobles. If one of the parties is a peasant, then there's really no cause for alarm. After all, the teachers have yet to intervene," Guiche replied.

"But that's only because this hasn't happened before…" Louise said lamely.

"My my, Louise, you seem rather attached to this peasant Familiar of yours…you wouldn't happen to be falling in love with him, would you?" Guiche asked, unable to resist taking a potshot at Louise.

Louise almost went as pink as her hair. "How DARE you!? Nobody with any decency would just stand by and watch their Familiar get torn to shreds!"

"Oh, _now_ you care about me," Lloyd snarked.

"Well, no matter what you say, the duel has already begun. Now move aside if you don't want to get hurt alongside your idiot Familiar," Guiche said, waving his rose. A single petal fell off the flower, and a pillar of light shot forth from it, transforming into a bronze statue wielding a spear and shield. "My name is Guiche de Gramont, but my Runic name is Guiche the Bronze. As such, this bronze golem, Valkyrie, shall be your opponent in my stead."

"Wait…what?" Lloyd asked. The next question never came out, as the Valkyrie surged forward and smashed its fist right into his stomach, sending the Vanguard Fighter to the ground in a heap of pain. "Ow…! Cheap shot…!"

"Oh, don't act all surprised. It should stand to reason that a mage as myself would use magic to fight, after all."

Louise dashed over to Lloyd's side. "You see? A peasant has no hope of fighting against mages!"

"Move over, will ya? I don't want you getting hurt," Lloyd replied, slowly getting to his feet, then crouching to allow his body to recover.

"Why did you get back up, you idiot!?" Louise asked.

"Because I'm not done fighting," Lloyd replied flatly.

"Oh. Guess I went a little too easy on you," said Guiche.

"Well, you got one good shot on me. However, now that I know what I'm up against, I'm ready to show off my true power." Lloyd clipped his deck case to his belt and opened it, pulling seven cards off the top. "So doll yourself up and get ready for a night on the town, Guiche de Gramont! 'cause Lloyd Kreis is about to take you on a ballroom blitz!" He looked at the seven cards. He'd specifically stacked his deck beforehand so he could call on his less expensive spells first, and one spell in particular seemed to stand out. So he took the card and held it forward. " **Master's Call!** "

The card shot out of his hand, glowing with white light before splitting into two orbs. As they disappeared, two small Myrs made of steel appeared in their place. The two of them smashed their fists together and faced off against Guiche and the Valkyrie, humming dangerously. The gathered students were in complete shock.

"He created golems just like Guiche!"

"He's gotta be a noble!"

"Are we sure Louise didn't summon this guy?"

Guiche was rapidly getting bent out of shape, seeing his opponent's hidden skill. Louise was, too, but it was for a different reason. "Where did you get this power from? AND WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME!?"

"Well, with the two of us going at it like we were, it got pushed to the wayside," Lloyd explained. "Well, Guiche, how about it? Still willing to dance? Come at me, bro!"

Guiche found his sneer again, but it was quite forced. "You're going to regret taunting me, commoner!" The Valkyrie charged again. Lloyd gestured, and one of the Myrs charged forward to meet it. The two golems collided in the air, but the Valkyrie's spear impaled the Myr, causing it to explode into motes of silver dust.

 _So it's at least a 1/2…_ Lloyd mused grimly. He'd used Master's Call specifically to use 1/1 Myrs to gauge Guiche's strength. Clearly this was no going to be no cakewalk. He quickly pulled out another card from his deck to replace Master's Call. But, he had plenty of other options in hand to deal with the Valkyrie. " **Perilous Myr!** " Another Myr appeared next to his compatriot, this one fatter and with pulsating green lines in its armor. _Let's see how he likes a little explosive maneuver…._

"Get him!" The Valkyrie shot forward once again. The Perilous Myr immediately trundled forward, impaling himself on the Valkyrie's spear. "Another one destroyed."

"Don't be so sure!" Lloyd countered. At once, the Perilous Myr's pulsing light increased in frequency, and Lloyd covered his head and hit the floor. "Everybody down!"

Everyone surrounding Guiche and Lloyd immediately took cover as the Myr exploded in a wave of green light, taking the Valkyrie with it as it was destroyed. Lloyd was the first one up, grinning. "Guess that answers that. Your Valkyries are 1/2 at worst and 1/3 at best. Tough, but I've seen worse."

"This isn't over yet!" Guiche waved his rose, summoning two more Valkyries to face off against Lloyd and his remaining Myr. Lloyd steeled himself for the next assault.

* * *

As this was going on, Professor Colbert had sought out the Academy headmaster. Old Man Osmond was a wizened wizard with a magnificent white beard and a black robe, and if there was anyone who could confirm his most recent findings, it was him.

"These Familiar Runes are only known to exist in legend," Osmond said, tapping a picture of the runes he was describing. Incidentally, they were the runes that had appeared on Lloyd's hand when he was first summoned. "Furthermore, considering it was the third girl of the Valliere family that summoned him…I'd venture to say this has something to do with one lost corner of the Pentagon…"

"That can't be...!" Colbet breathed, realizing the implications of that statement.

"Whatever this is, you must not speak of this to anyone. If you're going to investigate this further, please do it quietly."

"Yes, sir, I understand."

* * *

The fight between Guiche and Lloyd continued. Despite unveiling his Myrs, it was still dead even as Lloyd, now flanked by a **Gold Myr** and a **Palladium Myr** , was knocked to the ground again by a blow from one of Guiche's Valkyries, cards flying everywhere. Despite this, he still got back up, picking his cards up from the ground.

"Why are you getting back up again!?" asked Louise.

"I said I'm not done yet!" Lloyd snapped at her. "Palladium Myr, help me out here!" The silver-gray-plated Myr obeyed, silver energy swirling around him as brought out yet another card. " **Myr Reservoir!** " A large crater erupted in the ground behind Lloyd, forcing the crowd to expand the circle even more. "Gold Myr!" Gold Myr also summoned a wisp of white energy, which Lloyd used to power yet another card, forming into a gold-plated sphere. " **Origin Spellbomb!** " The Valkyries came at him yet again, and Lloyd called upon the same white energy as he threw it at one of them. "Hot potato!" The bomb exploded in white light, and yet another Myr appeared to intercept one Valkyrie, but the second broke through, smashing him to the ground for a third time.

It was clear the fight was taking its toll on Lloyd as he tried to get back up again. Louise quickly got in between them, her frustration now replaced with outright panic. "Guiche, please! Stop it already!"

"Leave him, Louise! I won't tell you again!"

Louise went to her knees, trying to keep Lloyd down. "Come on, that's enough. You did really well. You're really something different for a Familiar."

Despite his aching body, Lloyd forced himself to his feet. "I'm fine, Louise. Please, get out of the way." He grimaced, touching at his ribs. The repeated blows were enough to make him think he'd bruised a couple of them, if not broken them outright.

"Why did you think this wasn't going to hurt?" Louise asked him, practically on the verge of tears. "This makes no sense, why are you doing this!?"

Lloyd cracked a weak smile at her. "Hey, no crying now. I'm beat up, but I'm not down for the count yet."

"NO WAY AM I CRYING!" Louise screamed, punching Lloyd in the chest again.

"Gah! Geez, you still pack a wallop…"

Guiche scoffed lightly. "It seems you're still willing to fight. If you're going to continue…" Guiche waved his rose, and a petal fell to the ground. In a burst of light, a simple sword appeared in front of Lloyd and Louise. "Then pick up this sword. If not, then all you have to do is get on your knees and tell me that you're very, very sorry."

"Guiche, stop!" Louise snapped. However, Lloyd smashed his fists together and took a couple of uneasy steps forward. "Wait, stop! If you go any further with this, Guiche will not show you any mercy!"

"Mercy? I was under the impression that he wasn't going to show any to begin with," Lloyd replied. "Unless you call that back there mercy?"

"Stop it, Lloyd! I won't let you hurt yourself any further! As your Master, I order you to stop fighting right now!" Louise insisted, grabbing the artificer's arm. "Please! Just stop hurting yourself for this!"

Lloyd blinked. That had to be the first time since they met that Louise had actually used his name. And in that moment, Lloyd had a revelation as clear as the afternoon sky above them.

"...you wanted an awesome Familiar, right?"

Louise blinked, and then gasped a little as Lloyd patted her on the head a couple of times. "I freely admit, Louise: I was wrong about you. You're a good girl, even if your exterior's a bit thorny. So that's why I'm going to show you something. You're going to see your Familiar do something _spectacular_!" Pulling his arm away from Louise, Lloyd took the sword from the ground.

 **(BGM: The Boy Who Shattered Time [Ekko's Theme] - League of Legends)**

Guiche took that as his cue, and one of the Valkyries charged at him, thrusting its spear for a vital blow. But Lloyd, the Familiar Runes on his hand burning brightly, was ready for him. " **Metalcraft Dispatch!** " At once, Lloyd's sword ignited in white fire, and he swung. The Valkyrie fell to the ground in two halves.

A cry of surprise went out from the crowd. Louise, Kirche, and Siesta could only stare in shock as Lloyd expertly spun the blade in his hand, preparing it for another attack as red energy swirled around him. "Now let's _really_ bring down the house! **Metalcraft Galvanic Blast!** " Gold Myr, Palladium Myr, the walls of the Myr Reservoir, and Lloyd's sword crackled with electricity, and then let fly at the second Valkyrie. It promptly fell apart.

"What is going on!?" Guiche asked in shock.

"You gave an artificer a sword. Basically, you dun goofed!" Lloyd said.

"An artificer?" repeated Kirche.

"What on earth is an 'artificer!?'" Louise demanded.

"Talk later! Kicking ass now!" Lloyd produced yet another card. "Palladium Myr!" Palladium Myr unleashed its energy again as Lloyd threw the card. " **Myr Superion!** " Another Myr appeared, but this one was much bigger than its compatriots, almost Lloyd's height and armored like a mecha, appeared in the fray, smacking its fists. "Gold Myr!" Gold Myr unleashed white energy as more silver energy flowed out of the Myr Reservoir. " **Myr Galvanizer!** " Another Myr, this one plated in brass, appeared, with a pair of crackling lightning rods attached to its back.

Guiche responded by waving his rose twice in quick succession. Six petals fell off the rose and summoned six more Valkyries, sending them out all at once. Myr Superion charged, taking out two of them easily with its armored arms.

"Galvanizer! Reset!" Lloyd commanded. Myr Galvanizer unleashed arcs of lightning from its lightning rods in all directions, striking Myr Superion, Gold Myr, and Palladium Myr. At once, they shot up, fully alert, and shot into the air to counter. Gold Myr suicide blocked one, taking it out at its own expense, while Palladium Myr took down another one. As Myr Superion grabbed the last one out of the air in mid-flight, Lloyd himself entered the fray, cleaving it in half with a mighty slice as he ran past, menacing Guiche with the sword point.

"How about it, Guiche? Want to call it a day?" Lloyd asked.

"I…I yield…" Guiche lowered his head and dropped his rose.

"Good boy," Lloyd said, sticking the sword in the ground. Then, he promptly fell unconscious.


	2. Cards and Gods and Futures, Oh My!

**Hey everyone, HQ here with the next chapter of Artificer of Zero! Now, I know most of you were going on about how I was adhering too much to canon, so this next chapter ought to change things up while we get a glimpse of Lloyd experimenting with his magic!**

* * *

 **Turn 02: Cards and Gods and Futures, Oh My!**

When Lloyd woke up, he found himself in the familiar surroundings of Louise's room. However, what wasn't familiar to him at all was the fact that, for once, he was laying in something a bit more comfortable than the straw Louise had laid out for him. As he sat up, he realized why that was: he was laying in Louise's bed. He started for a moment, waiting for the inevitable backlash, but none came. How strange.

Looking down at himself, he noticed his shirt had been removed and bandages were wrapped around his chest and abdomen, and a touch of his head confirmed the same around his forehead. He knew he'd taken a pretty good beating from Guiche, but he was pretty sure it was a lot worse than it looked. Either that, or someone had healed him of most of his wounds while he'd been out and all that was left were the superficial bits.

The door opened, and in stepped Siesta, carrying a glass of water and two buns. Her smile immediately returned as she came over. "Ser Kreis!"

"Hey Siesta," Lloyd greeted, then winced as pain shot through most of his injured areas. "Gah! Mother of Christ…!"

"Try not to move too much, okay?" Siesta put her plate down on the table as she came over. "You've been asleep for three days and nights."

"Three days, huh? Sure feels like it…" Lloyd quipped. "Where's my deck?"

"I have it," Siesta said, reaching into her apron and producing it. "I wasn't sure you were going to wake up, so I held onto it so nobody could steal it while you were asleep. It was actually very interesting to see them up close, but I don't understand any of the words or numbers on them."

"That's not surprising. Only people who know the rules would be able to make sense of them, anyway," Lloyd quickly went through his deck, not quite sure what to expect. Strange enough, all of his cards were there, even the cards that had been used or destroyed, like Perilous Myr, Myr Reservoir, Dispatch, and Galvanic Blast. "What happened while I was out?"

"Well, nobody really knew what to do with you after you fell unconscious. So Miss Louise had you taken away to her room and those Myr things followed you. As the maids and I started cleaning up the mess and cordoned off the Reservoir for Professor Colbert to deal with later, suddenly they all turned back into cards, and there were even some new ones in there, too. So I collected them and took them back to your room, where Miss Louise said the other ones turned into cards as well."

Lloyd hummed in acknowledgement. Then he caught himself. "What do you mean, 'new ones?' Can you describe them?"

"Well, some were white and some were red. They had no words on them, just symbols, and they had pictures of meadows and mountains," Siesta explained.

"Meadows and mountains…" Looking back down at his deck, the cards Lloyd used were gathered at the bottom. And mixed in between those were six of his basic lands, four Plains and two Mountains. He quickly pulled them out and showed them to her. "Are these the ones you were talking about?"

"Yes. Why, what are they?"

"Well, for that, you'll have to wake up Louise. She's going to want an explanation about why her Familiar is better at magic than she is, and I'd rather do it now while I'm still recovering. Mostly because she's less likely to smack me," Lloyd jerked his head at the softly-snoring mage-wannabe in the corner.

Siesta bowed and quickly went over, shaking the sleeping pinkette's shoulder. "Wake up, Miss Louise. Your Familiar is calling for you."

Like a shot, Louise sprang up from her seat, somehow shoving Siesta away with a force that belied her short stature. "LLOYD! YOU HAVE SOME EXPLAINING TO DO!"

"Yeah, that's what I was afraid of," sighed Lloyd. "Louise, I'll explain everything, but you gotta calm down."

"I am calm!" huffed Louise, folding her arms. "I'm about as calm as I can be after my Familiar decided to pick a fight with a noble and almost got killed winning it!"

"Fair point, but if you want an explanation, you're going to have to take it down a notch, or twenty," Lloyd frowned. "Otherwise, I'm just gonna go back to sleep."

Louise growled, not wanting to concede anything to this cheeky commoner, or possibly a cheeky disgraced noble since he could use magic. And why couldn't she cast magic as good as him!? She was the Master and a noble, she needed to be the one to cast magic, not the other way around! But, when Lloyd groaned and flopped back into _her_ bed, she finally caved in. "Fine! But you're gonna have to get out of bed! Maid, fetch his clothes."

"Siesta." There was that deathly flat voice again.

"What!?"

"Her name is Siesta. I want you to call her that from now on."

"Me, use the name of a commoner!?"

"You already use my name. One more is not going to kill you."

Louise gritted her teeth. "Fine. Siesta, bring his clothes."

"Yes, milady." Siesta, having recovered from Louise's outburst, promptly picked up Lloyd's clothes from the ground.

"If you can, bring me parchment and something to write with, too," Lloyd added.

Lloyd then slowly got out of bed and made his way to the nearby table, taking a chair from nearby to sit in. Thankfully, he was still wearing his jeans, and the only things that had been taken off were his shirt and jacket. Louise promptly took the other. "Magic. Explain. Now."

Lloyd nodded, taking his shirt from Siesta and putting it on, but he hung his jacket on the back of the chair, and then placed a piece of parchment and a pen of sorts on the table. "Here's the thing. On Earth, magic doesn't exist. At least…not directly. While you guys work with magic, we study science. That being said, we still like to use magic as plot elements for other things, usually to describe some unknown force granting the impossible. And it is from that kind of magic that this card game, Magic: the Gathering, comes from." He promptly fanned out his deck in front of her.

"So these cards come from a game? Like chess?" Louise asked, taking one of the cards in front of her, which happened to be Myr Galvanizer.

"It's actually a pretty good comparison. In the game, the players are powerful mages known as Planeswalkers, engaging in a magical duel. And for some reason, when I came to this world, my cards somehow gained the power to come to life, through a process I have no idea how it happened," Lloyd nodded.

"So how does one became a Planeswalker?" asked Siesta.

"The way it was explained to me kinda goes like this: every universe in the world comprises a plane of existence, and the union of all of the known and possibly unknown planes comprises the Multiverse. Now, for every plane in the Multiverse, one in a million people possesses something called 'the spark.' The number of people who can ignite this spark is fewer still, enough that I could count them on my hands, but those that do become Planeswalkers, the most powerful mages that ever lived."

"Is…is it possible that the Familiar Summoning made you into a Planeswalker…?" Louise asked softly, her expression becoming more starry-eyed with every moment.

"I honestly don't know," said Lloyd. "It definitely sounds plausible, but I have no proof or means to find out. But if you did, then congratulations, Louise: your Familiar has the power of the Multiverse at his fingertips."

Louise said nothing for a moment, her face brimming with hope and amazement. Finally, the Zero had managed to perform a spell correctly, and didn't care that her Familiar, in stunning dramatic irony, had more magical ability than she did, or at least right now. Then she was herself again, brushing her hair and going back to a more noble-looking composure. "You have yet to explain how your magic works."

"Ah, now that is actually a bit more concrete," said Lloyd, clapping his hands once. "Now, Kirche was nice enough to explain how magic worked here, about how you draw power from the five elements: earth, water, wind, fire, and the lost element of Void. My magic is also divided into five parts, but instead of elements, we use different colors. And to do so, we harness power from the various lands they represent, called mana."

"So it's like the nature magic that the elves use."

"Of a sort, I guess," said Lloyd with a shrug. Kirche never mentioned that, so he had no idea what comparison Louise was drawing from. "Anyway, there are five colors of magic: white, blue, black, red, and green. They're not as strictly divided as your elemental magic, but each of them has their own unique aspects and powers. So let's start in what we call WUBRG order.

"White mana is represented by this sunburst, and it draws mana from plains and meadows. White is all about life, order, and vitality," Lloyd pushed out Master's Call from its place in his deck in front of her. "White creatures, typically knights and soldiers but also divine spirits like angels, are typically on the low end of power, but they have spells and abilities to increase their power in battle, as well as force creatures to…take defensive postures," Lloyd said, almost saying "tapping" but deciding against it, "meaning you really can't underestimate them when they fight. White is also the most defensive of the five colors, with spells that allow for preventing damage and healing."

"So that spell you used to cut down Guiche's Valkyrie was a white spell?" asked Louise.

"One of them was, anyway. Without its Metalcraft enhancement, the Valkyrie would've just been shoved off or something. I don't really know," Lloyd shrugged again, proceeding to draw on the parchment Siesta had brought. "Moving on from white, we have blue, represented by a drop of water. Blue is all about thought, control, and mentality, and their mana comes from islands. Blue creatures are typically creatures of the sea and air, and only blue has the power to harness Aether, which is raw magical power, in their spells. Also unique to blue is counterspelling, which is stopping a spell mid-cast, reversing the summons of your opponent, and spells that affect the mind. A good blue mage can destroy his opponent's mind with blue spells very quickly.

"From blue, we move on to black. Black is represented by a skull, and its mana comes from swamps and bogs. Black is the color of death, decay, and mortality. Black is all about power at any cost and using that power to take down anyone in their way. Black creatures are creatures from the bloody bowels of hell itself, like zombies, ghosts, and vampires, up to powerful demons like Griselbrand and Rakdos the Defiler. Black spells weaken creatures, if not kill them outright, poison their foes, and can reanimate the dead."

This naturally got Louise and Siesta's attention, both maid and noble leaning forward in shock and awe. "Truly? They can resurrect the dead?"

Lloyd winced. "It's not really resurrection, more like taking a body and turning it into a soulless puppet. Any semblance of personality the dead may have head is not brought back. You may as well be playing with dolls."

Louise actually recoiled in her chair at the thought. "So grotesque…!"

"Yeah. Let's move on to red, shall we?" Lloyd said quickly, pulling out Galvanic Blast from the deck. "Red is represented by a fireball, and their mana comes from mountains. Red represents fire, chaos, and ferocity. Like black, red specializes in removal spells, but instead of killing outright they rely on dealing damage with various spells. But unlike black, they can also turn that fire on the enemy Planeswalker. It's also the most aggressive of the colors, swarming the field with small creatures and crushing the enemy through sheer force of numbers. Goblins, giants, and dragons are the domain of red, although dragons are kind of a special case, as I've recently learned."

"But you used lightning earlier. Lightning is technically wind magic. Why would it be of the same color as fire?" asked Louise.

"Remember, my magic isn't necessarily separated by elements like yours is," Lloyd reminded. "Lightning and fire are both known for their destructive capabilities, and while all colors except maybe blue can destroy, nobody does it better than red. This leads me nicely to the last part of my lecture. Green is represented by a tree, and naturally its mana comes from forests. Growth, the hunt, and sheer brutality are the ways of green. The most powerful creatures in terms of raw power tend to be green, like the Tarmogoyf. Green can get mana in a hurry and summon humongous creatures of the forest, from wolves all the way to treefolk and humongous wurms."

He proceeded to spin the piece of parchment around, showing the five symbols drawn in a circle around each other. "Voila. As you can see, the way the colors are drawn like this, each one has relationships with the other colors, allies to some, like white is allies with blue and green," he drew an arrow detailing the shape of the circle. "And enemies to others, like white is enemy to red and black. We refer to this relationship as the color wheel. That is basically how my magic works at the most basic, fundamental level."

Louise leaned back in her chair, mulling over this information. Despite the rather in-depth description of his knowledge, she seemed to have understood most of it on the face of it. Lloyd hoped he wouldn't have to delve into the game itself, because he was already winded just from talking so much. Thankfully, Louise only had one thing to ask of him. "Your Myrs don't appear to have the symbols the others do, just numbers. Does that mean they not have colors?"

"Good eye, Louise," Lloyd nodded. "Myrs are artifact creatures. Artifacts, as a general rule, don't actually have a color. There are exceptions, but the majority of them are colorless." Louise beamed for a moment of self-congratulation. Lloyd decided to take the opportunity to steer the conversation towards something more important. "Look, Louise. As long as we're talking, I'd like to address something about our…current relationship."

Louise's face went flat. "What was that?"

"Look, Louise. I'm gonna level with you: we really cannot afford to ignore and snipe at each other like this." Lloyd started gathering up his cards. "Now that I've got a basic idea of what it is I can do, I'm not going to turn into your personal whipping boy and I sure as hell won't stand for it, either. So if we're going to do this, we need to drop this whole Master-Familiar business."

Louise's earlier good nature, which had already begun to fade, suddenly vanished under a wave of righteous indignation. "You want me to _what!?_ "

"I think it's more than fair," Lloyd said calmly, returning his deck to his case. "I'm no noble, but I'm still a mage and I deserve to be treated as such. So from now on, no more Master-Familiar business, no more nobility-commoner business. You and I are partners. Equal shares in whatever it is the two of us get involved in."

"And why would I do that!?" Louise snapped, sparks flying out of her mouth.

"Because we need each other," Lloyd countered. "Without me, you go back to being Louise the Zero who can't do jack-diddly in the ways of magic. But without you, I barely know left from right when it comes to this place. So as long as we're going to be together, it's high time you bit the bullet and actually started caring about somebody other than you with your heart and soul."

Louise growled. She _really_ wanted to whip him for his base ingratitude and even suggesting the idea that they weren't supposed to be Master-Familiar anymore, but partners, like her father would make deals with armorsmiths for the Tristain military. Couldn't he see that there was supposed to be an order to these things!? But, on the other hand, and as loth as she was to admit it, Lloyd did have a point. She did have the awesome Familiar she wanted and the last thing she needed was him running off. Kirche wouldn't ever let her live it down, for one. For another, she was going to need him to help rehabilitate her position, not just in the school, but with her family at some point.

"Alright, alright, fine. What did you have in mind?"

"Excellent," Lloyd smiled. "Already this process is going smoother than I hoped…"

* * *

As Lloyd soon found out, Murphy's Law knows no bounds, even across the Multiverse.

"Why the hell did I agree to this!?"

The next day after their rather heated negotiations, Louise woke him up early for the usual song and dance: wake up, get her dressed, go downstairs for breakfast, but Louise had also unceremoniously dropped a basket containing all the laundry from the three days Lloyd had been out at his feet and told him to wash it while she was in class. Despite the shouting and the grumbling that followed thereafter, Lloyd still took it down to the nearest clothesline. He knew better than to throw out all his hard work from the day before.

Of course, the obvious problem was that Lloyd couldn't just throw the clothes in a washing machine and wait around for the next half-hour and change. In this world, you still had to do it manually, and Lloyd couldn't even hope to know where to begin. He was more self-conscious about asking Siesta for help than afraid of waiting for the eventual blow-up that would follow. Stupid Puritan values. He'd rather be exploring his powers.

Eventually, Lloyd decided to settle on killing two birds with one stone.

He took out his deck, trying to take one of his Plains out. Surprisingly, no sooner had he started fanning out his cards than one Plains near the back shot out, then dropped to the ground. Surprisingly, it shattered on contact with the ground like thin glass, and a small white haze was now orbiting around his wrists. How convenient. Pursing his lips, Lloyd started searching for Origin Spellbomb, one of the only three cards he knew that could be cast for one mana. At once, the card, somewhere in the middle, jumped to his hand.

"This is new…" He tapped his chin in thought for a moment, then waved his hand over his deck. Surprisingly, the deck spread out as it followed the movement his hand, orbiting around him like the rings of Saturn. "Hot damn!" Then, as if on comedic cue, all the cards suddenly dropped to the ground. Cursing, he quickly piled them together, keeping his Origin Spellbomb in between his fingers. It would be definitely something if he could keep that going in a fight. It'd allow him more freedom while casting, obviously. Moving on from there, he quickly held out the card like he did in the duel against Guiche. " **Origin Spellbomb!** "

The mana around him swirled around him like eddies of white mist, going into the card, and in a burst of light, the card transformed into the bright yellow metal sphere he used against Guiche. "Perfect! At least I got casting down pat…" Tossing the spellbomb in his hand for a moment, he lobbed it into the air, pointing at it. "Hot potato!" The haze followed the arc of the artifact and caused it to explode, dropping a single steel Myr at Lloyd's feet. It gave an electronic squeak, ready for action.

"Okay! Coming along pretty darn well…" Lloyd nodded, satisfied. He put his deck away, then, on a whim, held two fingers over the deck, thinking of Master's Call. Like a shot, it came out into his deck as a red stream of mana was quick to follow, joining the white mana that had now returned. So there was some delay between him casting spells and the mana returning to him, which he kind of expected anyway. "Now then…let's get some of your buddies out so we can get this crap over with. You ready, buddy?"

The Myr chirped, saluting.

* * *

Louise's morning class had passed without event. Of course, she could've done without Kirche whispering about "Louise the Zero" yet again. She was half-tempted just to blow up the redhead Germanian floozy just for that, but she decided against that, mostly because she'd end up exploding herself, with how her luck appeared to be. But, maybe some cake in the courtyard would get her mind off of it.

" _But it's the only life we'll know! Blaggards to the bone! So don't wreck yourself, take an honest grip, for there's more tales beyond the shore!_ "

Louise actually blanched. Oh Founder, there was only one person she knew with that voice. What on earth was he singing? And more importantly, why wasn't he doing her laundry! Against her better judgment and in full view of Kirche, she sped off towards the singing and the laughing around it. What she saw when she arrived was…bizarre.

" _Well the years rolled by and several died, and left us somewhat reelin', in and out came crawlin' out, and spewed upon the ceiling! What became of rebels who sang for you and me? Grappling with their demons in their search for liberty!_ "

Lloyd was indeed doing her laundry, collecting it off the clothesline as he was singing some bawdy tune, whistling a few bars in between the words. In a group around him as he was throwing the laundry behind him was a group of five Myrs, three of the standard steel ones, the Gold Myr he used against Guiche, and another Myr she didn't recognize, though it seemed to shimmer in the noonday sun. One caught at and then tossed it to two more behind it, who then folded it, and then two more who put it in the basket. While on its own it'd be less of a problem, the bigger issue was that at least ten or twenty students were gathered around him, some laughing, others clapping with the beat.

" _Sail away where no ball and chain can keep us on the roarin' waves! Together undivided, but forever we'll be free! Sail away upon our rig, the moon is full and so are we! We're seven drunken pirates, we're the seven deadly sins!_ "

"Well, I will say this: at least it won't be boring around here with your Familiar around," Kirche observed with a chuckle, having followed her.

"Shut it, Zerbst!" Louise snapped, rapidly starting to lose her temper.

Lloyd, however, having finished folding the laundry, picked up a nearby stick and started leading his Myrs in a circle like a parade. " _Sail away where no ball and chain can keep us on the roarin' waves! Together undivided, but forever we'll be free! Sail away upon our rig, the moon is full and so are we! We're seven drunken pirates, we're the seven deadly sins!_ And again!"

" _We're seven drunken pirates, we're the seven deadly sins!_ " the crowd echoed.

"One more time!"

" _We're seven drunken pirates, we're the seven deadly sins!_ "

"HEY!" Lloyd finished, him and his five Myrs striking a pose, to wild applause. "Thank you, thank you! I'll be here all week! Actually, I'll be around a bit longer, I think!"

"LLOOOOOOOYD!" Louise had finally had enough, splitting the crowd like Moses splitting the Red Sea.

"…oh, bloody hell…" sighed Lloyd.

* * *

Siesta finally managed to return to her room in the maid's quarters. All in all, it was an exciting time. For as much as she was afraid that Lloyd was going to get killed taking on Guiche, she was happy that he won with his strange abilities and even happier he was awake after the ordeal. She really wanted to hear more about the country that he was from where there was no nobility and no magic, and deep down, she wished she could cast magic like Lloyd. Despite being a maid in the Academy that paid relatively well, all things considered, there as little hope for advancement unless some noble decided to take her in and marry her.

Suddenly, something caught her eye. Placed on her bed, almost like a gift on her pillow, was a stack of familiar-looking cards. She went over to the bed and picked them up. Sure enough, they were Magic cards, just like the ones Lloyd had. Were they also his and she'd forgotten to take them back when she went to see them last? She flipped the deck face-up and much to her surprise, the deck appeared to be completely different from Lloyd's. Lloyd's Myrs were colorless, and yet this deck was primarily red and blue, save for one or two golden cards that she definitely knew were not in Lloyd's deck.

Siesta felt the air around her suddenly begin to tingle. Her hair began to stand on end, and a clean, almost sterile smell filled her nose. As she looked around for the source…

CRACK! KABOOM!

A single bolt of lightning, on a clear, cloudless night, shot right through the window and struck her head-on. The resultant sonic boom shattered the rest of the window and sent Siesta flying across the room, still clutching the deck. She lolled around on the ground for a moment, deafened temporarily by the thunderclap and still twitching from the electrical charge. She was still alive, that much she knew, but something else had happened in that split second. A voice, powerful and deep, had sounded her head.

" _Follow me, and the future shall be yours to see._ "

Siesta had seen something in that moment, something she wouldn't forget in a hurry. She wanted to tell someone, anyone, but who would believe her? Would Lloyd even believe her?

She sighed and instead decided to go to sleep, but it would be a fitful, dream-wracked sleep. As she tossed and turned, one name filled her head, a name she saw in the deck that she now had in her possession.

Keranos.

* * *

The next few days were the same as the other three for Lloyd: wake up, wake up Louise, get her dressed, contemplate suicide after mussing up her laundry, shove it away for the rest of the day on the promise of breakfast and maybe spend more time trying to master his powers now that he wasn't bogged down in laundry. The recent ban on singing songs from Earth was kind of a pain, though. It wasn't like he was trying for an audience, he just got bored halfway through conducting his Myrs in doing laundry and people were passing by!

As Lloyd munched on the lonely piece of bread in the empty chair Louise had reserved for him, the sound of clattering and shattering china reached his ears. Looking past the other row of students, he noticed that Siesta had dropped a plate of something, scattering food all over the floor. It didn't look like she tripped over anything, it just seemed to slip out of her hands. How strange.

"I'll be right back," Lloyd muttered to Louise, stuffing the rest of the bread in his mouth as he left his chair to help Siesta. "Siesta? You okay?" Siesta turned to face him, and Lloyd recoiled in shock. Siesta clearly hadn't been sleeping well, her eyes red and puffy, and her eyes seemed to be looking everywhere but at the person in front of her. "Good God, Siesta, look at you! Are you sick?"

"Is' nothing…" Siesta mumbled, trying to pick up the remains of the shattered plate.

"The hell it is!" Lloyd wasn't having any of that, though. "Come on, we'd better get you back to your room and get some sleep before you end up killing yourself…" He reached out and grabbed her by the hand.

Suddenly, Siesta's head shot up, as if she'd spotted something right behind Lloyd, and her tired eyes suddenly flared with some kind of mystic energy, almost like she was containing the power of the galaxy within her. Lloyd shook her shoulders, trying to snap her out of her trance, but his voice had faded into silence as images began to fill her mind once more.

 _Lloyd was kneeling atop a hill, bloodied and full of arrows. The remains of his Myrs lay scattered around him._

 _The area around him lights up with magic from more sources she could hope to count. The magic arcs up into the sky like a thousand shooting stars._

 _Lloyd spits out blood, looking up at the impending doom above him. He closes his eyes and says something. She cannot hear it, but she can see his lips say the words. "I love you."_

 _The magic comes down on him. He embraces death with open arms. When the smoke clears, his body is almost unrecognizable._

Siesta yanked herself free from Lloyd's grasp, barely able to catch her breath in her exhausted and sleep-deprived state. Lloyd is confused and now very worried. "Siesta, what the hell!?"

"Stay away from me…!" Siesta cried, unaware of now everyone in the whole school staring at her.

"Siesta, what's wrong?"

"Please! Don't come any closer!"

"For God's sake, at least let me take you back to your room! You need rest!"

"NO! YOU'LL DIE IF YOU STAY WITH ME!"

Lloyd had no reply for that one. Siesta, uncaring of the ruckus she was causing, immediately ran off, sobbing. For a moment, nobody said or did anything in the great hall, the place quieter than it probably had been since the last vacation break.

"Lloyd…?" Louise asked. She didn't know whether to be concerned for her Familiar or start berating him for chasing off the maid.

"What in the high holy hell just happened!?"

* * *

Needless to say, rumors were already spreading like wildfire, especially those who had seen Siesta come hurtling to his rescue before his duel with Guiche, saying maybe Siesta and Lloyd were up to "extracurricular activities," to put it lightly, and were potentially inviting bad luck or intervention from the nobility by staying together. Lloyd really wanted to say something, at least for Siesta's sake more than his own, but he knew the better play was to keep his head down, stay away from Siesta for the time being, and deny everything if asked directly.

Meanwhile, Lloyd, dragged along by Louise, was now sitting in on one of her classes, and Lloyd was at least happy enough for the distraction. Kirche's explanation of Halgekinian magic from the week before was a good one, but now he could get more info on it. As it turned out, mages were divided by Class, as dictated by the number of elements they could control. Dot Class was one, Line Class was two, Triangle Class was three, and Square Class was all four. However, classification wasn't strictly based on that. Combining two elements to create an effect, like combining fire and earth for lava, was very difficult. Instead, mages layered spells on top of each other, almost like Splice onto Arcane from Kamigawa or spells with Kicker and Multikicker from Zendikar, so a Wind-Wind-Wind composition was a Triangle-Class Wind spell.

As the lesson continued, Lloyd quickly stole a look around the classroom. Most of the students in the classroom were focused on the lesson, save for three: the first-year girl Katie from the incident with Guiche, Kirche, and Tabitha. Katie seemed mighty stressed out by something she had at her desk as well, and she was whispering to her friends about it. Tabitha was reading another book. As for Kirche, well, she was clearly trying to tempt someone by playing with the edge of her blouse, and, well, that someone certainly had to be him, as she kept throwing smoky looks his way whenever she could.

"Will you stop staring at her!?" Louise hissed, grabbing her Familiar by the ear, earning a surprise yelp from the artificer.

"Miss Valliere? Is there a problem?" the professor, a homely gray-haired woman named Professor Chevreuse, quickly homed in on the two.

"No ma'am," Louise said, promptly letting go.

"It's fine," Lloyd echoed, massaging his ear.

"Good. Then you wouldn't mind giving us a demonstration on elemental association. Please transmute these stones to glass, if you would," Chevreuse gestured to three rocks, each about the size of a man's fist, on the table.

"Um, Professor, you really shouldn't! Louise is…" Kirche began.

"If I hear anyone call her a 'zero' again, I will stuff their mouths with clay," Chevreuse checked the redhead, giving her wand a threatening twitch. "She at least completed the Familiar Summoning, and this is hardly a difficult spell. Even someone with difficulty casting basic spells should be able to do this without challenge." She turned back to Louise. "You may begin."

Louise nodded, taking her wand and pointing at the rocks. She began to utter an incantation that sounded something like French. Already students were taking cover behind their desks, as though someone had announced they'd be setting off dynamite.

"Say, ser Kreis…" Kirche's voice puffed out like dandelion seeds on the wind. "Do you have any kind of defensive magic in that deck of yours? Something that can protect us?"

Lloyd quickly went through his deck list in his mind. While he lacked spells that granted protection (and he wasn't sure what that would accomplish, anyway, as he had no idea what color this would fall under), he did have a couple of combat tricks to protect himself from incoming damage. "Maybe. I'll give it a shot." He opened his deck case, thinking of two spells in particular. At once, they jumped into his hand. A Plains was quick to follow, shattering into mana, and two more joined his spells on standby. Chevreuse was only half-aware of it, but Louise fed him that searing sideways glare mid-incantation. Lloyd merely made a motion with his hand, telling her to continue as the second Plains became mana around his wrists.

Finally, Louise finished the spell, magic jumping from wandtip to stone, a strange electric crackling noise filling the air as they began to spark with rainbow energy. A few brave students poked out to see what was about to happen, and Lloyd took that as his cue. He dropped the third Plains, then threw his card outward. " **Safe Passage!** "

KABOOM!

The rocks detonated with the force of a hand grenade right as Lloyd threw his charged card into the center of the room. The explosion actually sent shockwaves through the walls and upended the desks in the room, and every single window shattered from the impact. Thankfully, Safe Passage was a global effect designed to protect himself and other creatures from damage, and by the looks of it, the students appeared to be perfectly safe, if still spooked from being in the same room as Louise casting magic.

Louise herself was not so lucky. She was still upright, thankfully, but she was covered in soot and her clothes were practically in tatters. Professor Chevreuse, despite her proximity to the blast, was still decent, although definitely a little dizzy from the force of the blast. Lloyd could definitely see now there was no sense in denying his Master's title anymore: she really was Louise the Zero.

"You see that!? That's why we don't let you try casting spells!"

"Your success rate is zero! That's why we call you Louise the Zero!"

More and more insults came flying out of the gathered students, and Louise simply stood there, quivering in frustration and agony. Unable to let his Master suffer further embarrassment, he finally took off his hoodie, making his way to her. "OKAY, WE GET IT! NOW SHUT UP, ALL OF YOU!"

The insults quickly died down as Lloyd put his hoodie around his Master's shoulders, trying to cover her up at least a little. "You're welcome, by the way…" he added grumpily as an afterthought as he turned back to Louise. "You okay? No broken bones?" Louise shook her head. "Good."

The nearby door burst open, and Professor Colbert as well as a green-haired woman Lloyd didn't recognize, dashed in. Once they saw the room's condition and their students all unharmed, they shared a look that apparently said they'd seen this scene quite a few times before. "Louise de la Valliere, go get a change of clothes and present yourself to the headmaster at once. The rest of you, classes are cancelled, you may go about your business. Miss Longueville, if you would…" The two faculty members went to work hauling the disoriented Chevreuse out of the room.

"You don't have to come with me," Louse finally spoke, her face still hidden under the hood.

"Alright, I hear ya," said Lloyd. Looking behind him, he saw Katie chatting with some of her friends as she left with the others, picking up the words "strange" and "maid" as she passed. "Just leave my jacket on the back of the chair before you go see the headmaster. I've got some digging about this morning's events to do anyhow."

"Very well." Louise said, her sharpness returning a little.

 _What was that all about?_ Nonetheless, Lloyd gave Louise a quick hug, then filed out with the others, zooming in on Katie, still chatting away with her friends.

"I didn't even know what to think when that maid told me, but now that I've actually seen it…I don't know…"

Suspicions abounding, Lloyd made a beeline for the first year, clearing his throat to get their attention. Katie visibly jumped as Lloyd's towering presence appeared alongside her. "Lord Lloyd! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to insult Louise further, but…"

"It's alright, I'm not here to chastise you on it. Truth be told, I didn't think it would be that bad and that you guys were just calling her Zero just for kicks," Lloyd said with a dismissive wave.

"Oh, hardly, Lord Lloyd," Katie nodded. "From what I hear, even basic spells end that way for Louise. I'd almost hate to see what happens if she starts trying more advanced spells."

Lloyd nodded. While he wasn't fond of the treatment she'd gotten, it was at least understandable, to know it was less of spite and more out of fear of personal injury. "So what's this I hear about a maid? Does it have something to do with what you were stressed out about in class earlier?"

Katie actually looked surprised at the question. "Yes, actually. I had penned an essay for another class talking about elemental associations of various precious gems. I was trying really hard to get it right, especially with my first year, so I was working on it over dessert the other day. But then this maid came up to me to serve my cake, and then…she started acting weird."

"Weird how?" Lloyd tilted his head.

"I don't know. She accidentally brushed my hand and had this weird spasm, like she'd been stung by a bee," Katie said. "She almost ended up putting the cake in my skirt. Then she looks at me and says in this dead-sounding voice, 'that paper isn't going to end well for you.' But I thought she was just not feeling well, because she looked really tired."

Lloyd frowned. That definitely sounded like Siesta in the condition he'd found her in this morning, but if that was at least two days before this one… "And? How did the paper go?"

Katie hung her head and merely handed it over. Lloyd didn't bother reading it, the red markings and stern words at the bottom said everything he needed to know about how it ended. "Ouch."

"It was my fault, really," Katie started poking her fingers together. "I spent all night trying to revise it because of what she said and didn't realize I'd botched it up as much as I did until I had to turn it in."

Lloyd gave back the paper, his mind already considering the avenues. If Siesta's outburst was tied to this event somehow, he would need to find out more about Siesta's activities in the past week. Unfortunately, he wanted to give the other maids a wide berth, lest he make the situation any worse, so he would need a secondary information source. "Do the maids have a place they hang out in between assignments? Do you know?"

"I do know they like to frequent the kitchens a lot. They say there's so much extra food after the meals the maids will go there for a snack so they can keep their strength up."

 _Perfect!_ "Thanks, Katie."

* * *

Lloyd retraced his steps from his first meeting with Siesta, through the empty halls to the kitchen. With the day quickly ticking down towards evening and dinner, the whole place was abuzz. There was one man in the center of it all, dressed like the very definition of a French chef de cuisine, conducting his men in the hustle and bustle of a crowded kitchen. He was built powerfully with thick, hairy arms, but he still had a chef's dexterous hands as he manned the stoves, barking out orders as he did.

Lloyd would've loved to stick around just to watch him work, but even though the kitchen was fairly spacious, he'd be getting in the way. So he turned to leave, resolving to return when things settled down.

"Oy! You there!" And Lloyd turned around again, realizing the man was talking to him. "You got any business with me or my boys, it'll have to wait until after dinner service! Until then, you can see your noble ass out."

"So you're the guy who runs this Scooby-Doo outfit?" Lloyd asked, not entirely fond of the way the man was speaking to him. Were chefs always this temperamental?

"Aye, that's me," the man said, dropping his pan on the stove for a minute. "What exactly do you want?"

"I'm a friend of Siesta's. I was told someone on the kitchen staff would help me if it involved her or one of the other maids around here. Am I right in assuming that's you?" Lloyd replied.

The man gave Lloyd a once-over, then a twice-over. Once he realized he wasn't wearing an academy uniform, Lloyd's identity was clear to him. "So you're that Familiar who took down Guiche de Gramont last week, the one that Siesta's been talking about, eh? My apologies, I didn't quite recognize you there." He held out his hand. "Name's Marteau, I'm the head chef around here."

Lloyd took it, trying to fight down the wince that followed the man's crushing grip. "I'm Lloyd Kreis. Familiar of Louise de Valliere."

"So I've been told. What do you need to know?" Marteau asked.

"I'm gonna keep it brief, since I caught you at a bad time," Lloyd said. "Did you start noticing any weird changes in behavior from Siesta lately?"

"I guess so," Marteau shrugged, quickly returning to the stove. "She's been over the moon about you, you know. Saying stuff about how you're from a country where there's no nobility or magic and how your magic comes from playing cards. Wanted to actually go there herself, you see."

"I bet she would. But I'm talking something a bit more recent, maybe in the last three days or so."

Marteau put down his pan, musing on the question. "Now that you mention it, she has been acting less like herself lately. Normally she's so bright and cheerful, she'll make anybody's day better with that smile of hers. Now she's been so…reserved, and I swore I caught her muttering to herself at some point. I thought maybe someone in her family died or something."

"How certain are you about that?" asked Lloyd.

"Don't know. Never really wanted to ask her about it. Why, what are you trying for, Lloyd?"

"Just the facts, Marteau. Tell me, did anything major happen after my duel with Guiche? I was out of it for a few days, so I've been a little behind the times."

"…actually, there was this thing Siesta mentioned around the day after you came back around," Marteau realized. "She actually said she was struck by lightning in her room that night."

"Struck by lightning? How? Some kind of lightning magic?" Lloyd said, his voice getting firmer.

"Hardly. There's a curfew at sundown for all students, even the third-years," Marteau said. "She figured it was just a freak accident, 'cause there was no weather at all that night or even the following morning. Then she said she heard someone whisper a name in her ear."

"A name? Do you remember it, by chance?"

"Nah. Waved it off as a near-death experience and not important, but I'm pretty sure it starts with a K."

The color immediately drained out of Lloyd's face. Freak lightning strikes, ill omens, and someone with the letter K associated with it all? Lloyd's Magic lore identified the culprit immediately, and now there was serious danger afoot. "Oh God, that is _so not good_. Where is she now?"

Marteau, sensing the rising distress in the artificer's voice, took off his toque. "She's probably in her room in the servant's quarters. Alain, watch my station, I'm gonna go with Lloyd to check on Siesta!"

"Got it, boss!"

* * *

Marteau and Lloyd made their way through the halls, weaving through the students who were on their way to the great hall for dinner. Finally, they managed to reach a separate wing of the castle that functioned as the servant quarters. As it was still early enough in the evening, there were only a handful of maids currently in the main room. The three or four maids that were there looked up, confused about Marteau and Lloyd's presence there.

"Girls, we're looking for Siesta. Where is her room?" Marteau asked.

One of them, a blonde maid, pointed down the hall. "Down that hall, second door on the left. She's been in there all day."

"Thanks," Marteau led the way down the hall to the door they specified, and then knocked on the door. "Siesta! It's Marteau! Can I come in?" There was no reply. Marteau knocked again. "Siesta! I've brought your friend Lloyd here! Come on, talk to us!" Still nothing. "This isn't good. What do you want to do, Lloyd? Should we go back?"

Lloyd looked at the door for a moment, and then pushed against it slightly. The door creaked open a little. Lloyd pushed it a bit more, and the door opened, revealing Siesta kneeling in the middle of her practically-destroyed room, staring up at the ceiling.

"Great Founder…" breathed Marteau.

"Stay here," Lloyd warned the chef, opening his deck case. Three cards, two of them Plains, jumped to his hand. He dropped one, the card forming into a haze of white mana, and kept the other two behind his back as he approached Siesta. "Siesta?" Siesta said nothing. After creeping in behind her, he spun around to her front, preparing to defend himself if whatever was awaiting him had set up a trap. But there was none. And instead, Lloyd saw something that shocked him right to his sneakers. "Mother of God…!"

Siesta's eyes were blank. Actually, blank was a strong word for it. Instead, her eyes seemed to have glazed over with that same starry energy from before. He'd seen the image before on a Magic card before. It was at that moment he also noticed something else was in the room. It was a clean, almost sterile smell. It smelled like ozone, which Lloyd knew was an aftereffect of lightning strikes. There was also a kind of salty smell in the room, as if he could smell the ocean.

Wait. Ocean? Here?

"Why did you come?" Siesta suddenly spoke, looking up at him with the star-filled eyes. "I told you. If you stayed, you would die." Her voice was different now. It was almost ethereal, and had an echo-y feel, like he'd stepped in a church.

"Siesta. Marteau told me about what happened to you. Katie told me about how you knew about her essay," Lloyd said, taking a knee. "How did you know any of that?"

"They tell me," Siesta replied blithely.

"Who? Who tells you?"

"The creatures."

Lloyd blinked, then looked down at what was in Siesta's hands: a deck of Magic cards. Lloyd quickly checked his deck case and found it still full. Somehow, someone had given her a deck, and now it was causing her to act like this. "Siesta. Where did you get those?"

"I don't know…I just found them…" Siesta whimpered.

"Found them where!?"

"In my room…now they show me things…show me the future…they show me things but I can't do anything to stop it…"

That all but confirmed Lloyd's suspicions. "Did Keranos tell you that?"

Siesta's starry eyes widened. "How did you know about him?"

"Any Magic player worth his salt knows who the fifteen Gods of Theros are," said Lloyd. "But it's okay. Just give the deck to me and maybe it'll all go away." He held out his hand to her.

Siesta reached out with a hand, trying to drop the cards in Lloyd's, but her hand shook and her grip stayed firm. "…I can't…!"

"Yes you can."

"No I can't! I…I wanted to be like you, Lloyd! To be a commoner and use magic like you…! I can finally help my family now…for real, this time…!" Siesta's eyes began pouring over with tears.

"Siesta, this deck is mentally tearing you apart. I don't want to lose my new friend over this. Give me the deck."

"Lloyd, I can't!"

"Siesta!" Lloyd reached out and grabbed the deck.

" _ **You dare raise a finger to me!?**_ " Siesta suddenly stood up, her voice now reverberating with a deep brass echo. Suddenly, a familiar red haze began to swirl around her hands, and a lone card flew out of the deck." _ **Lightning Strike!**_ "

The hair on Lloyd's head stood on end for a brief second, and Lloyd took the opportunity to make his next move. He threw one card to the ground, and the held out the other. " **Soul Parry!** "

CRACK! KABOOM!

The lightning bolt soared through the broken window…

…

And struck Lloyd dead-on in the chest. The Planeswalker-hopeful was launched out of the room and into the hallway by the blast as a second haze of white mana joined the rest. Lloyd had dropped the wrong card, and his would-be spell didn't block it. Of course, Lloyd had forgotten Soul Parry didn't work like that, so it wouldn't have even worked even if he had cast it.

Marteau took this as his opportunity to get out of the way. "Everybody clear out! Lloyd, come on!"

"Make yourself useful and get help!" Lloyd snapped, coughing as he got to his feet.

" _ **Stormcaller of Keranos!**_ " Siesta was already on the move, mana flaring around her as it formed into a beautiful woman in red and blue silks. " _ **Strike him down!**_ "

Lloyd reached out to his hand, thinking of Soul Parry. The card twitched in its place on the floor, then shot to his hand. " **Soul Parry!** "

This time, the spell worked without a hitch, absorbing the blast of lightning from the Stormcaller, and he quickly took off running, with Siesta floating along in hot pursuit.

"Lloyd!? What are you doing here!?"

Lloyd's eyes widened as he saw Louise coming his way, apparently just now having finished her business with the headmaster. He quickly summoned a third Plains and let it drop, then mentally called for Safe Passage as he tried to wave his Master off. "Louise! Get out of the way!"

" _ **Bolt of Keranos!**_ " Another bolt of lightning shot forward, homing in on Lloyd.

" **Safe Passage!** " Lloyd countered, throwing out the card behind him as he tackled Louise to the ground to protect her. An angelic silhouette intercepted the card, and the lightning forked around him, one half striking the wall and the other striking the ground harmlessly.

"Lloyd! What in the Founder's name is going on!?"

"That's what!" Lloyd said, pointing behind him as the possessed Siesta kept going at them, more mana accruing around her. "Now we need to get out of here!" He called on a Mountain and dropped it as he hoisted his Master his feet and grabbed her in a fireman's carry, taking off running as he called on another spell. " **Tempered Steel!** "

" _ **Stymied Hopes!**_ " Suddenly, the card shot out of his hand was swallowed whole by a wave of blue fire.

"What did you do to her!? She's casting magic!" Louise screamed at him.

"News to me!" Lloyd snarked as he rounded a corner and put Louise down.

"How is she casting magic!? She's a commoner!" said Louise.

"She got her hands on a Magic deck like mine! Now she's been possessed by it and now she's basically gone berserk!"

"How did she get a deck?"

"I don't know! I know _I_ didn't give it to her, my Myr deck is the only one I had on me! Plus, my Theros deck was Green-Black Constellation deck! I never used blue-red!" Lloyd poked his head out behind the wall, and a **Magma Jet** soared past, tearing up the sleeve of his shirt and burning his shoulder. "GAH! DAMMIT!"

" _ **You cannot escape me! I can see your every move!**_ " Siesta, or at least what was controlling her, declared.

"What do we do!?" Louise asked, glaring at her wounded Familiar to hide her fear.

"Take this fight outside! I've already sent for help, they should be here soon!" Lloyd summoned a Mountain and dropped it, then called on four more cards. " **Signal Pest!** " A small goblin-like golem appeared in Lloyd's hand. " **Shimmer Myr!** " The glimmering Myr Lloyd had summoned a few days prior was next to appear. " **Panic Spellbomb!** " Another spellbomb, this one shaped like a rosette and made of iron and bloodstone, was next to appear. " **Mox Opal!** " Finally, without any mana at all, a small glimmering metal stone cut like a gem appeared in his hand.

"So wait, what exactly is the plan-" Louise began.

"RUN NOW!" Lloyd gave Louise a hard shove down the hall. Immediately Siesta and her Stormcaller barreled down on her, but Lloyd got in the way, lobbing the Panic Spellbomb right in the Stormcaller's face. Then, he gripped the Mox Opal, summoning more red mana from it as he pointed at the arcing bomb. "Pineapple surprise!" The bomb exploded, and the Stormcaller screeched, gripping at her eyes. The Signal Pest and Shimmer Myr took that opportunity to charge and swarm Siesta while she was defenseless, allowing Louise and Lloyd to escape outside.

"Well…if nothing else, it's nice to know my casting IS getting better…" Lloyd joked.

"This is no time for jokes! A commoner just tried to kill us with magic!" Louise snapped at him.

"No, really!?" Lloyd snapped back at her.

More people came running out of the doors to join them: Marteau, followed by Professor Colbert and Miss Longueville, and, strangely enough, the entirety of the student body. "What are you guys doing here?"

"You said get help, I brought it," Marteau said, gesturing to Colbert and Longueville.

"There's a huge racket going on in the castle and you expect us to not seek refuge as far away from it as possible?" Kirche asked with shrug.

"I wanted everyone to stay in the castle because I was going to drag the fight outside!" Lloyd explained.

"Well, it's hard to control people when the first idea you have for clearing the area is yelling 'troll in the dungeons,'" Marteau shrugged. Lloyd groaned at that one, massaging his forehead.

"Mister Kreis, what in the Founder's name is going on!?" demanded Colbert, trying to get the conversation to important matters.

"You want the long version or the short?" Lloyd asked. Upon getting only expectant stares, he explained everything he'd found in his investigation and the current state of things with Siesta apparently being possessed by the deck.

"And you expect us to believe this how?" asked Longueville skeptically.

"I'll vouch for him," Marteau said. "I was right there next to him she blasted him with some lightning magic clean across the room."

"Plus, I didn't exactly get cooked on the shoulder just for kicks," said Lloyd, gesturing to his ruined sleeve and the raw burn on it from the Magma Jet.

"Whatever it is that's going on, I blame you, Louise," Guiche said flatly.

"Don't get ahead of yourself, scrub," Lloyd snarled at him, earning a rather undignified squeak from Guiche.

Suddenly, the door burst open, and Siesta floated through out into the courtyard, starry energy and mana swirling around her like a veritable storm of magic, cards orbiting every which way around her as the Shimmer Myr and Signal Pest flew backwards from the force. She floated to the ground, mana and celestial power swirling around her as a card lifted up from the deck. With this sudden influx of power, day almost seemed to turn to night as a bronze-skinned figure almost as big as the Academy itself seemed to descend, wearing the very cosmos as a toga.

"Ah, the puppetmaster reveals himself," Lloyd grunted.

"Is that him!?" Marteau asked, in awe of the humongous figure before him.

"That it is. That, Marteau, is **Keranos, God of Storms,** and the thing that's controlling Siesta, most likely," said Lloyd.

"Wait, you're saying that thing is a GOD!?" Louise shrieked at him.

"One, take it down a notch, Louise. Two, yes, one of fifteen in the pantheon. And three…well, I'm a little iffy on if it's the genuine article," Lloyd said, watching as Siesta offered the God a card. Despite the massive distance between them, Lloyd could see the card was an **Omenspeaker.** Suddenly, the card sparked, transforming into a massive bolt of lightning, which he then threw at Lloyd. The blast launched him backwards, careening over the heads of the other students, and then painfully to the ground. Most of the students took this as the cue to get out, running for the safety of the outer walls as Lloyd scrambled to his feet, Signal Pest and Shimmer Myr coming to defend him.

" _ **Omenspeaker!**_ " A bald woman in a white robe appeared, his eyes hidden under a headband. Two cards lifted from the deck. One started orbiting around Siesta while the other disappeared from sight. " _ **Knowledge is mine! Now behold my power!**_ " Another bolt of lightning shot of the sky behind Keranos, striking down the Signal Pest. The Stormcaller then charged at him, hoping to get a free shot.

"Step right up!" Lloyd countered. "Shimmer Myr! Turbocharge!" Shimmer Myr began to gleam brightly as Lloyd summoned forth a card from his deck. " **Myr Galvanizer!** " At once, the lightning rod-equipped Myr sprang to life, lightning striking the Shimmer Myr as Lloyd directed it to block the Stormcaller. The Stormcaller was fast, but the Shimmer Myr was faster, smashing it down into the ground. It promptly disappeared into motes of red dust.

"Yeah, I think I'm getting better at this magic thing," Lloyd grinned. "Now, let's get this party started off proper! Go, **Myr Turbine!** " A massive tower rose up behind Lloyd, pulsating with energy. With a wave of his hand, a lone Myr popped out, ready to defend. Then, he grabbed a second card. " **Origin Spellbomb!** " The familiar white and gold bomb appeared in his hand, which he then put in his hoodie as he charged headlong at Siesta, trying to reach her. "Siesta!"

The Omenspeaker got in the way of the Shimmer Myr, and promptly fell to the artifact creature. But Siesta merely held out another card. " _ **Searing Blood!**_ "

The Shimmer Myr began to steam and then promptly exploded, showering Lloyd in debris. Then, he screamed as he felt his very blood reach extreme temperatures in a few seconds, sending him to the ground right at Siesta's feet.

" _ **You really have no concept of my powers, do you?**_ " Keranos grabbed him by the neck in between his fingers and hoisted him over Siesta's head, threatening to choke him. " _ **Don't you see, Lloyd? With this power, I can finally give my family a better life! I could finally get a better life for myself, too!**_ "

"Working for your family…it's very noble…" Lloyd eked out, feet kicking as the God threatened to squeeze the life out of him. "But…I think…you're looking at this the wrong way…"

" _ **You don't understand, Lloyd. I was just a maid before. Now I'm a mage, a commoner mage just like you. And with this magic, my family can become a noble family, too! No more having to obey nobles who abuse their positions, or think they're better than me just because they can use magic! And on top of all that, I don't need to worry about marrying someone to send my family more money…**_ "

"I'm no fan of the nobility, either, but this won't solve the problem!"

" _ **I thought you would be supportive of me, Lloyd! You come from a country where there is no magic, or nobility! Wouldn't you appreciate helping commoners like me find a way to get the life we deserve?**_ Slowly the god's massive fingers began to squeeze…then spark with a familiar rainbow energy Lloyd had seen before. " _ **What!?**_ "

KABOOM!

An explosion erupted right on the back of Keranos's hand. Being a God and therefore indestructible, nothing was destroyed, but the surprise was enough to make him drop Lloyd to the ground, gasping for air.

"Come on! Even the one time I want my magic to blow something up, I still screw it up!"

Both of them looked over to find that Louise had shown up, wand in hand. She looked mightily disappointed, probably because she attempted to use a spell to save Lloyd and ended up getting another explosion. Siesta and Keranos both glared at the mage. " _ **Now that was not wise.**_ " Siesta offered Keranos a Mountain as two more cards jumped to her hand. " _ **Fated Conflagration!**_ _**Knowledge and Power!**_ "

A humongous wave of fire and lightning rose up from Siesta, intent on consuming Louise whole, but someone got in the way, his Familiar runes glowing brightly amidst the surging flames. Even as his shirt continued to be torn apart, Lloyd remained standing, standing defiantly in front of his Master. If he'd been burned at all, it wasn't showing on his skin.

"Lloyd!" Louise said, very much surprised by what she'd just seen.

"Why the hell did you come back!?" Lloyd asked.

"Is that any way to talk to your Master!? A Master who also just happened to save your life, on top of that!" huffed Louise.

"You're very noble, I get that, but hello, god of storms!?" Lloyd said, gesturing to the humongous being in the sky.

"Oh, I can just _see_ you've got him well in hand!"

"I've got Dispatch! Gods are less dangerous when you exile them into an inter-planar oubliette!"

" _ **Enough!**_ " Keranos actually created a thunderclap, cutting in on the conversation.

"SHUT UP! YOU'RE INTERRUPTING US!" Lloyd and Louise countered, rounding on Siesta with eyes blazing.

Siesta and Keranos actually flinched. Lloyd took that opportunity to drop a Mountain and then throw his Origin Spellbomb at Siesta. "Hot potato!" It exploded in Siesta's face, summoning another Myr as he summoned his next card. " **Frantic Salvage!** " The scattered remains of his Signal Pest, Shimmer Myr, Origin Spellbomb, even the Panic Spellbomb in the castle, suddenly flocked to the card in Lloyd's hand, the metal transforming back into mana as it was drawn inside. Then, it transformed into the card Lloyd was hoping to draw from it: Shimmer Myr. Then, he pointed at the Turbine. "Turbine! Generate!" Another Myr was quick to follow, taking up defensive positions with his two fellows. " **Iron Myr!** " Another Myr, this one more blocky and made of rust-streaked iron, was next to join them.

" _ **Do you think summoning all these creatures will be enough to save you from a painful death!?**_ " Siesta offered Keranos a **Stormchaser Chimera** , who then cast down lightning at Lloyd's Iron Myr.

"I like to think of it as being prepared!" Lloyd pulled out his Mox Opal from his ruined hoodie's pocket, summoning red mana from it "Iron Myr!" As Keranos's blow hit, the Iron Myr unleashed a haze of red mana, which Lloyd used to fuel his next card. "Flash cast! **Shimmer Myr!** "

" _ **I won't let you! Dissolve-!**_ " Siesta was quick to counter with a card of her own.

"Louise! Cast a spell at her now!" Lloyd said.

"What? What kind of spell?" Louise asked, surprising someone would be asking her to do anything related to magic with her reputation.

"I don't know! Fireballs! Icicles! Drop a bucket on her head! JUST SOMETHING!"

Louise, whether for fear of what Siesta's spell would do or fear out of what Lloyd was expecting, pointed her wand at Siesta and muttered the fastest incantation she could think of. The Dissolve that she was holding sparked and promptly exploded, knocking Siesta off of her feet.

"YES!" Lloyd cheered, as his Shimmer Myr re-emerged with no ill-effects. "Who said that magic wasn't useless!?"

Louise just stared at her wand. She wasn't expecting much other than her usual explosions, but she realized Lloyd had used that to his advantage, using the explosion to distract Siesta from casting the spell. However, Siesta wasn't quite done. " **Stormchaser Chimera!** " A quadruped winged beast appeared, with the head of an eagle and a ram as it gave a bestial roar at Lloyd and Louise.

"Let that one through, I've got a way around it!" Lloyd said, stopping Louise from raising her wand.

" _ **Oh? You would really want to hurt me, Lloyd? But I thought we were friends!**_ " Siesta asked, trying to cute her way out of it.

Lloyd merely drew a card. "I'm friends with Siesta the maid, not Siesta the megalomaniac. **Metalcraft Concussive Bolt!** " Lloyd's card called forth his own lightning, zipping past Siesta's Stormheart Chimera and striking her right in the head, once again knocking her to the ground. "Pin her to the ground!" Lloyd's Myrs responded, shooting past the immobile Chimera and dogpiling on top of the maid. As Siesta struggled under the Myrs holding her limbs down, Lloyd quickly dashed in, and wrenched the deck out of Siesta's hand.

At once, the situation was resolved. Keranos, the Stormchaser Chimera, and an assortment of lands, creatures, and various spells Siesta had used returned to the deck, piling on top with the remainder of its buddies. Even the starry eyes Siesta had had throughout the ordeal had vanished, replaced with the sleep-deprived ones from that morning. "Lloyd…?"

"It's okay, Siesta. It's over now," Lloyd said, brushing the young maid's hair lightly as he motioned at the Myrs. At once, the Myrs, the Myr Turbine, and all his other expended cards returned to his deck case.

Siesta didn't even bother waiting until the rest of Lloyd's cards had returned before the maid embraced him, sobbing hysterically. "I'm so sorry, Lloyd! I'm so, so, so sorry! I didn't mean to hurt you or Louise or…or…or anything, really! It was the cards! They...they..."

"I know," Lloyd nodded soothingly. "Now just sleep. You've had a rough week. I'll take you back to your room." Siesta nodded, sniffling.

"So…now what?" Louise asked.

"Go to the others and say it's safe to come back now. And get Professor Colbert, he's going to want an explanation for all of this."

Louise actually looked away a moment. "Actually, I'd…I'd prefer if you went with me, once you've dealt with Siesta. They…I don't think they trust me enough."

Lloyd considered it. "Fair enough. I'll be right back. You just wait here, and come get me if any of those things come back, okay?"

"Okay."

Lloyd nodded, picked up Siesta bridal-style, and made his way to the doors. Then he stopped, and flashed Louise a smile. "Good job, by the way. I couldn't have gotten through that without you."

Louise gaped for a moment, not expecting her Familiar to give her praise, but beamed all the same. "Well, of course you couldn't."


	3. I'm Burning For You, Lloyd Kreis

**Turn 03: I'm Burning For You, Lloyd Kreis**

The week after the incident with Siesta and Keranos was definitely an interesting one for everyone involved. After Lloyd tried to explain what had happened without really explaining what had happened to Professor Colbert, Colbert took his case to Headmaster Osmond. Osmond, however, came back and said that Siesta, due to everything that happened, was to be put on a regiment of sleeping potions and promptly given a week's sabbatical. Lloyd mostly suspected this was mostly a means to protect the school through plausible deniability, if any particularly chatty students wrote home about a maid spontaneously gaining magical powers, but when Siesta came back to the Academy she was her usual kind and bright self, and nobody was asking any questions.

As for the deck, Lloyd had managed to smuggle it away while no one was looking and had been experimenting with it over the week, usually in the morning once he was done with Louise's chores or well past sundown, and in the large meadow outside of the Academy where he was certain he wouldn't be discovered. A few people were asking questions about the spontaneous lightning strikes in clear weather, but most people dismissed it as aftereffects from Siesta's rampage and not important. Lloyd found it worked very much the same as his Myr deck, although he suffered none of the same adverse effects that Siesta had apparently suffered. No visions, no attempts by Keranos to usurp his mind.

As he returned to the Academy that night, pocketing the Red-Blue Scryburn deck in his hoodie, he was surprised to find Siesta waiting for him at the Academy gates. "Siesta. How goes the day?"

"It's been good," Siesta nodded. "Come on, Marteau wants to give you something."

"Oh?" Lloyd raised an eyebrow as Siesta took him by the hand and led him back into the castle to the kitchen, where Marteau, and in fact the maid and kitchen staff, were waiting for him, where Marteau had a hot meal waiting for him. "Wait, what? Marteau, what is this?"

"This here is our gift to you, for saving us from Keranos," Marteau said, gesturing to the spread before him. "It's not much, as it was created from the leftovers from dinner tonight, but please eat as much as you want."

Curious, Lloyd made his way to the table and took a sip of the soup on the table. Immediately his mouth exploded with flavor, and Lloyd was instantly hooked. "Dude, this is spectacular! You actually made this out of leftovers?"

Marteau grinned. "You might say I have some magic of my own, even if it doesn't come from elements or colors. And I'd happily showcase my skills for the appreciation of Our Sword!"

"Our…Sword?" Lloyd asked around a mouthful of bread.

"Well, you may be able to use magic, but you're a peasant just like us," Marteau said. "You took Guiche de Gramont a peg, and you saved Siesta! That's why we've decided to call you Our Sword, the pride of us peasant folk!"

"An artificer as a sword for the common man…" Lloyd said, musing on the words. "I actually kind of like that."

"Tell me, ser Kreis. Is it true that you come from a country with no nobles?" one of the chefs asked suddenly. "And that your country was founded by commoners who rose up against the nobility?"

Lloyd looked over at Siesta, confused. He did say something like that, but it was mostly just an off-hand rejoinder to something he told her the first morning he came here. He wasn't expecting Siesta to remember it, let alone tell everyone. Upon getting an expectant stare from her as well, Lloyd nodded. "Yes, yes I am. Truth of the matter is, though, it's pretty complicated and there's a lot to tell about how the country was born."

"Well, it's not like most of us have homework to be doing," another chef cracked, earning a few laughs from the congregation. "Tell us, ser Kreis. Tell us about your country."

Lloyd took another bite of bread, then proceeded to do so. He explained the origin of the United States as colonies of Britain, the birth of "no taxation without representation," the Boston Tea Party (that got more than a few gasps and laughs out of the crowd for its audacity), the Battles of Bunker Hill, Lexington, and Concord, and concluded with the Declaration of Independence and a brief description of the American Revolution. Everyone was raptly paying attention to Lloyd, and he had to wonder if there was a certain utopian image they were holding in their heads of this place called The United States of America.

Eventually Siesta and Marteau managed to cut in, suggesting everyone take off for the night and allow time for Lloyd to get back to Louise's room. As Lloyd left the kitchen back into the courtyard, Siesta came back out to join him.

"Thanks for inviting me to meet the rest of the crew," said Lloyd.

"You're quite welcome. Please, come by the kitchen any time, especially if Miss Valliére forgets to feed you again," Siesta said. "Because of what you did for me and for beating Guiche, we're all willing to help you, too."

"That's good to know," Lloyd nodded, looking up at the night sky. "Even though I can't go home anytime this soon, it is nice to have this place as home for the time being."

Then, Siesta's face became serious. "…Lloyd, I don't know if you're aware of this, but you were truly in a terrible situation following your duel with Guiche. Miss Valliere actually spent a great deal of money for a potent elixir in the hopes that your wounds would heal, and she was really in relief to see you were alright."

"Was she? It's hard to tell with her, sometimes," Lloyd said glibly. "I mean, I know that Louise is really a good girl under all the thorny aristocratic pride, but some days it's just…I gotta dig for it, know what I mean?"

"Dig for it?"

"I mean, I feel like I'm missing some context about why Louise is the kind of person that she is, and I every time I try to ask what her life was like, she either clams up, throws me another chore to do, or worst case scenario, she tries blowing me up with magic for reasons even she can't give me. Do you know something? Anything at all?" Lloyd asked hopefully. Siesta merely shook her head. "Damn. Well, it was worth a try. Anyway, I'd better get a move on, lest Louise starts thinking I've run off again."

However, as Lloyd turned to leave, Siesta spoke once more. "U-um…Lloyd? I'd like to have a long talk with you next time." Lloyd stopped in his tracks, glad that Siesta couldn't see his cheeks flushing bright red. "Is something wrong?"

"Oh no. Far from it…" Lloyd said quickly. "I'm sure we will again at some point though. Anyway, see ya."

"Good night, then."

The two friends parted, but Siesta swore that, just barely out of earshot, she could hear Lloyd give a loud whoop of joy.

* * *

" _Sing us a song, you're the piano man! Sing us a song tonight! You've got us in the mood for a melody! And you've got us feeling alright!"_ Lloyd was walking on air the entire way up to Louise's room. It was kind of hard to explain why, but the best way he could was that he was just sure he'd been taken on a date by Siesta, even if it was just for a hero's feast made by Marteau and company, and the promise of a second one. Sure, there was no mention of the word date or even what passed for a date in Tristain, but he didn't care.

Unfortunately, right as he rounded the corner up onto the second floor, he found someone, or something, blocking his path. And that something was a familiar red-frilled lizard, a lit flame on its tail. Lloyd opened his mouth, closed it, thought for a second, and then said, "I remember you. Aren't you Kirche's Familia-" Suddenly, the lizard charged at him, somehow knocking the taller man to the ground in a tackle most linebackers would find impressive. "OW! Stupid scaly bastard, what are you-HEY!" Then, it grabbed him by the seat of his pants with its mouth and promptly hoisted him off in the direction he'd been going, past Louise's room on the second floor and up unto the third. "This isn't funny! Don't make me zap you, you Godzilla-wannabe!"

Finally, the salamander dropped him on the ground in a darkened room. As Lloyd's eyes corrected for the lack of light, he could see there was still light, it was merely coming from several purple candles on the floor. There was a flowery smell in the room, like lavender, and the window was open, where the blue moon was poking through the curtains. "Um…this is new…"

"Welcome."

And there was Kirche, dressed in a purple negligee and panties, right smack dab in the center. Words had completely failed Lloyd, as he sat in dumbfounded awe at what was in front of him and the events transpiring at that moment. He was almost certain he'd fallen asleep in the middle of the hall and he was dreaming now, but whether he felt it prudent to try and wake up or sit back and enjoy the ride was so far back in his mind it was just so much noise.

"Welcome to my suite, Lloyd Kreis…or was it Lloy d'Kreis?" Kirche asked, smoky look and teasing tone in full force.

"…um…you had it right the first time…" Lloyd finally managed to eke out around his surprise. "But just Lloyd is fine…"

"Lloyd it is, then…" Kirche moved one of her arms, letting Lloyd catch a full glimpse of her figure. It took all of Lloyd's willpower to not have his nose explode in blood. "Some might say I shouldn't be doing this. But you see, my Runic name is Kirche the Ardent. And like a torch, I'm easy to turn on."

"You don't say…?" Lloyd said, trying to play it cool. Already his mind was singing the hook of R. Kelley's "Bump n' Grind," just to add to the scene playing out before him, even as he was looking from the opened door to the third-story window, plotting escape routes the moment he had an ample distraction.

"You just don't get it, do you? I'm in love. With you. It always come so suddenly, like a lightning strike. You know what I mean, after all. You harness lightning in your spells, do you not?"

"Well, of course I do…"

"The way you faced and defeated Guiche with your Myrs, and helped to defeat that God that possessed the poor maid last week, you looked so handsome. Now Kirche the Ardent has become Kirche the Passionate, and I want to be closer to you…"

"Kirche!" Suddenly, a new voice had appeared in the open window: the guy Kirche had been schmoozing when he'd just first arrived.

"Ah! Sticks!"

"You didn't meet up for our rendezvous, so I came here looking for you!"

"Sorry, but could you come back in two hours."

"That wasn't our deal!"

In a move Lloyd could almost describe as Darth Vader-esque, Kirche took her wand from…wherever she'd had it before and pointed it at one of the candles. The flame spiked a good foot in the air, transformed into a snake, and shot at Sticks's face, throwing him out of the window.

"Aren't we three stories up?" Lloyd asked glibly.

"He's a mage. He'll be fine," Kirche said airily, putting her wand down. "But don't worry about him. Right now, I want to focus on-"

"Kirche! I want to know who that man is! I was told we'd have a night of sweet-" Another mage, this one blonde, had shown up in the same window. Kirche took her wand again and unleashed the same spell, throwing him out the window to meet Sticks's fate.

"Am I cutting into something?" asked Lloyd, his snark starting to come back. "I feel like I'm cutting into something."

"Don't worry, those two were just a couple of old friends," said Kirche. "But right now, the night is short, and I don't want to miss a single thing…"

"KIRCHE!" Suddenly, three more mages had shown up all at once at the window. "YOU SAID YOU DIDN'T HAVE A BOYFRIEND!"

"Manica! Ajax! Gimli!" Kirche was now in full-on damage control mode. "Ahh, then in six hours-"

"It'll be morning by then!" the boys chorused angrily.

"Flame!" Upon her command, Kirche's salamander suddenly shot to the window and unleashed a huge gout of flame from its mouth, knocking all three to the ground in a burning heap with the rest.

"You have many friends here, I must say," Lloyd snarked, trying hard not to think about how many targets were now on his back. Suddenly, Kirche threw herself on top of him, pinning him to the floor. "Ungah-!"

"I love you, Lloyd Kreis…" Kirche moaned, now going right back into seducing him.

"Kirche, I'm flattered, but…" Lloyd said, trying to bow out of this without hurting her feelings too much. "I've been away from Louise since early this evening, if I don't get back to her soon, she's going to get suspicious…!"

"Just let all that go, Lloyd…" Kirche said. Just for good measure, she pressed her chest against his, really trying to get him to surrender to his inhibitions. "I'm more than Louise the Zero could ever hope to achieve…"

 _Well, she's not wrong…_ that dark part of Lloyd's mind chimed in, a sure sign that Kirche's seduction was already winning him over, even if his mind was still desperately holding out for a way that wouldn't make him the target of every male mage's envy. Then Kirche kissed him, and Lloyd's mind decided discretion was the better part of valor. Using his arms, he drew Kirche closer to him, the two of them continuing to kiss. "Please understand, though, I do have my…reservations."

"Reservations? What could you possibly fear, my love? If it's Louise the Zero, then-"

"No, no, it's not Louise I fear, it's you," Lloyd said. "You burn like a torch, that is true, but you seem to draw many moths around you. Once is happenstance, two is coincidence, but five? How can I be sure you'll always be mine? Or worse still, that you'll not burn me like you've done to the others?"

"Oh, Lloyd! My love for you is as eternal as the phoenix! Though we may die, our love shall go on, and shine brighter than all the stars in the sky!" Kirche gasped, her one visible eye now teary.

"KIRCHE!" And that was when the door opened, and from his upside-down point of view, Lloyd could see one Louise Francoise Leblanc de Valliere in the doorway, dressed in her nightgown and looking mightily displeased with what was transpiring.

"Ayup, that's also what I was afraid of…"he sighed.

"We're quite busy right now, Valliere," Kirche said. She hauled Lloyd into a sitting position but then latched onto him, not ready to let him go.

"Zerbst, just whose Familiar do you think you're working over!?" Louise demanded.

"What can I say? Love and flame are the ways of the von Zerbst. I only wish to burn in the flames of love, and your Familiar was more than happy to oblige…" Kirche said with merely a shrug.

Louise rolled her eyes and instead turning her searing gaze onto her Familiar. "Lloyd, come. We're leaving."

"Wait! He may be your Familiar, but he's also a proper human being!" Kirche quickly cut in. "To get in the way of romance is purely unethical, even for you!" Lloyd gave a slight shout of surprise as Kirche suddenly shoved his head into her cleavage, just to stress her point. "Right, Lloyd?"

 _You gotta be kidding me! Must this woman know every single one of my weak points!?_

"Louise, come on. It's just one night…" Lloyd said, hoping to get a rain check from her and discuss things when she wasn't so infuriated.

Unfortunately for Lloyd, Louise wasn't having any of that, her body already trembling with barely-checked fury. "Well, you certainly can. But come tomorrow, you'll be ambushed by ten different aristocrats, all of them out for your blood."

Lloyd groaned. As much as Kirche was right in suggesting he was a human being who needed this kind of…well, release (if you'll pardon the pun), Louise was also right. It had been a week since he'd saved the school from Siesta's rampage, and barely a few days removed from beating Guiche in full view of the school. As much as he would've wanted to let Kirche do as she pleased with him, Lloyd knew he couldn't risk any more attention, positive or otherwise, to himself than he already had.

"Fair enough. Perhaps another time, then," Lloyd disentangled himself from Kirche, standing up. "Rain check?"

"…very well…" Kirche said, going for the teary-eyed look again. "But my door is always open for you, Lloyd Kreis. Remember that."

Lloyd would have replied, but Louise had already begun to drag him out of the room by his ear.

* * *

The return to Louise's room was silent, even when Louise threw him back into the room and locked the door behind them. Once that was done, though, Louise's temper returned all at once, exploding onto her Familiar. "YOU'RE JUST SOME MANGY DOG IN HEAT, AREN'T YOU?!"

"Louise, it wasn't even like I went there for my own sake! I got snatched on my way back to your room!" Lloyd countered, expecting her to blow him up again, but Louise walked right past him, going right to the dresser and pulling out a long, thin, rope-like object from one of the drawers. "The hell do you have a riding crop for!?"

"I was wrong to consider that you may be a human," Louise said flatly.

"What are you getting at?" Lloyd asked.

"To think you'd wag your tail for just about anyone, and to Zerbst, no less…YOU DOG!"

Lloyd stepped back, adrenaline already shooting through his body. He really didn't want it coming down to this, but he could tell this was already getting dicey for him. Slowly he opened the deck case containing his cards, summoning three cards from it. "Louise, for the love of God, if you do what I think you're about to-"

"If you're going to act like a stray dog, then I'll just have to treat you like one," Louise said, raising the whip. Lloyd took a step back, and the heel of his back foot hit the door, reminding him he was trapped.

"Louise-!"

THWACK.

"Ow."

THWACK.

"Stop that."

THWACK.

"Seriously!"

THWACK-THWACK-THWACK.

"What part of that woman is so good that you-"

Lloyd's patience finally gave out.

" **VOYAGE'S END!** "

The card Lloyd had called, fueled by a Mountain and an Island, vanished from Lloyd's fingers. At once, a wave of Ӕther crested behind him, transforming into a small tidal wave that swallowed Louise whole and shoved her into the opposite wall with as much force as Lloyd was willing to put into it.

"I told you I wouldn't stand for that whipping boy thing anymore!" Lloyd snarled, the water already vanishing into the air around them. "Consider yourself lucky I went for a bounce spell and not, say, a burn spell like Scouring Sands or Fated Conflagration. So as long you're on my level for a change, let's get to the real issue, shall we?"

"What…issue!?" Louise asked around coughing up seawater.

"Are you really angry that you think I went behind your back to go see Kirche? Or are you just jealous you couldn't do that kind of stuff with me without a bit of help?" Louise's reply was neither of these. Instead, her foot promptly shot out with the force of a small cannon and caught Lloyd right in the balls, causing the Planeswalker-hopeful to flop right to the ground. "SONOFABITCH!"

"You and me!? How _dare_ you!" Louise snapped, standing right up and driving her foot onto his head for good measure.

"What is your problem with my balls…!?" Lloyd groaned, his voice at least full octave higher now.

"Look, if you're going to court someone, that's fine, but the only one you're not allowed to see Kirche von Zerbst. The Zerbst and Valliere families have been rivals for several generations, now, and for even a single piece of thread or a dog stolen by them is the greatest humiliation! Got it?!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah…just be ready for lightning bolts to the face if you whip me again…" Lloyd groaned, rolling over so he could sit back up.

"And just for daring to strike back at your Master, I'll be confiscating your other deck!" Louise said with finality, taking the Myr deck from the table nearby and stuffing it in a nearby drawer.

"Ah but-ugh, whatever," grunted Lloyd, deciding to bow out while he had whatever of his dignity was left.

"Now...you want to tell me why you went to Kirche's room instead of coming straight back here?"

"It wasn't my call! I got shanghaied by Kirche's Familiar on my way in! You didn't hear me causing a commotion in the hallway?"

"Ugh...for a supposed 'Planeswalker,' you're quite pathetic on your own. Couldn't even use your cards at all?"

"And risk causing an even bigger commotion than Siesta getting possessed by a God of Theros? Yeah, that would've turned out just _swell._ I'd feel better if I had a sidearm I could use when I can't use my cards."

"Sidearm? Is that like a sword?"

"Any weapon, really, just so long as it's light and fast on the draw."

Louise actually considered it. "...that is a thought. It may also have something to do with your contract, as well."

"Contract? You mean these runes that activate whenever?" Lloyd asked, showing Louise his runes.

"The idea behind it is that when a Familiar gains a contract, they can sometimes gain an ability. A cat bound as a Familiar may suddenly speak, for example. And seeing as your runes activated when you picked up that sword against Guiche..." Louise pondered it for a moment, then nodded to herself. "Very well. Tomorrow's Voidday, and seeing as there's no classes, I'm taking you to town with me to find a sword for you. I need to go anyway because I have my own errands to run."

"Sounds like a plan," Lloyd nodded.

* * *

Kirche couldn't deny it anymore. She was in love!

Indeed, Lloyd Kreis had managed to waltz his way into her heart, and only the intervention by that Valliere brat had managed to hold them off from their true destiny. Well, there would be a way around that. Today being Voidday, Kirche's plan was to head him off on his way out to wherever he went to practice using his cards, and if she played her cards right, they'd make sweet, sweet love in the meadows until sunset. As she went to the window, however...

"How do you stay upright on these things?! I feel like I'm about to fall off!"

"Just stand up straight and hold on to me! …ack, not there!"

SMACK.

"OW! For God's sake, Louise, why must punching be your first response to everything?"

Kirche watched as Louise and Lloyd left the Academy on horseback, bickering all the way. On a holiday, there was only one place anyone would go, and that was the local township nearby. Well, that would still factor into her plans just fine. But for that, she was going to need to get there ahead of them, and she knew just the person to help her out.

"Tabitha!"

Tabitha was once again in her room, her nose in a book. However, when she looked up, she saw that she couldn't hear Kirche due to the Silence spell she'd put in the room to ward out distractions. She sighed, summoned her staff, and muttered an incantation.

"-'m telling you, Tabitha, we have to leave! Now!"

"Voidday," Tabitha said bluntly.

"Yes, I know it's a holiday and we're supposed to use it to bond with our Familiars, but I need your help! I'm going after Lloyd and the Valliere brat!"

Tabitha gave her a hard stare. "Bad explanation."

"But I'm in love, Tabitha! I was hoping to spend the holiday with him and the Valliere had to whisk him off into town today! I need to head them off somehow, and I need you and Sylphid for that!"

"...the other five?"

"They were just friends! A means to exercise my passions and stay fresh! It's real this time, Tabitha, he's the one! Pleeeeeease? You're my best friend, right?"

Tabitha said nothing. She really hoped she wouldn't invoke that, but now that she had, there was no real reason to turn her away. Besides, she reasoned, maybe she'd find another book to read while they were going around town. "Fine."

"Thank you!"

Tabitha went to the window and whistled. Her blue dragon Familiar, Sylphid, came flying up to the window, having been outside looking for food. The two girls jumped from the window onto the dragon's back, Tabitha putting her staff in its holder on her back.

"Two people on horseback. Tall boy and girl with pink hair. Don't eat them."

Sylphid nodded and took off, following the road Lloyd and Louise had taken.

* * *

After a while, Louise and Lloyd finally made it to the town, and Lloyd could see why Louise chose today to go: not only was it a holiday, it also took them a good three hours just to make it. They'd make it back to the academy by sundown, assuming they found what they were looking for quickly. But this town was fairly large, and there were no signs hanging over the doors like there were back home. Actually, there was, but they were all pictograms, so Lloyd reached for his deck, thinking he could summon his Myrs…oh wait. At least he still had Siesta's deck.

"This is gonna take a while, especially with all these people around," said Lloyd, dismounting from Louise's horse as he started thumbing through the deck for cards that would garner the least amount of attention, and eventually pulled out two of them, as well as the requisite mana. " **Flamespeaker Adept! Stormcaller of Keranos!** " At once, the Stormcaller appeared, as well as a man in white robes. "Find us the local weapons shop, would you please?" The two creatures bowed and walked off into the crowd, and Lloyd and Louise went off in another direction. "And what the heck is with all the signs? How is anyone supposed to find their way if you can't read signs or a map?"

"There are signs, Lloyd," Louise said airly, no doubt referring to the symbolic ones he could pick up from the street.

"No, not like that. I mean, why are there no words? Am I just supposed to guess what each one is from the pictures? Signs with words are less ambiguous."

"Because commoners can't read," Louise said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "They lack the resources or time to learn how to read. Usually they have to learn trades from their parents or from a master in a guild. The only ones who can read typically are scribes, courtiers, and librarians."

Lloyd opened his mouth, then closed it. He'd finally remembered where exactly he was. "Ah. Damn, forgot about that."

"You make it sound like everyone can read where you can come from," Louise observed.

"If I remember correctly, literacy rate back home was…what, seventy percent? Sounds about right."

"Seventy percent?" asked Louise, amazed by the figure he brought up.

"Yeah. Three out of every five people in my country can read, which is a lot more I could probably say for everyone else here. As Thomas Jefferson said, 'an educated citizenry is a vital requisite for our survival as free people.'"

The Stormcaller returned. It did not speak, but instead pointed to the northwest, signaling the shop was at least on the next street over. Lloyd nodded, returning him to the deck and summoning back the Flamespeaker Adept. Despite flying through the air from wherever it had been, nobody seemed to really notice the card zipping through the card, probably waving it off a quick gust of wind blowing through. "This way."

They started down the street and then turned onto another. On the street corner was a large shop with a sign depicting a hammer and anvil hanging over the door. That had to be their destination. And upon entering, this was confirmed as there were not only swords, but weapons of every size and style in barrels and on the walls. If their first guess was off, well, this was probably one of the best ongoing practical jokes in town.

"Hellooooo?" asked Lloyd, looking around.

Suddenly, the store owner popped up from the desk, and Lloyd could tell this one was a snake-in-the-grass with his rat-like face. "Hello, good sir and madam! What can I do for you today?"

"I'd like a sword for my Familiar," Louise said.

The man gave Lloyd a once-over, not believing her story at all. "This is your Familiar? But he's a commoner!"

"It's a long story," said Lloyd flatly.

Louise had taken what looked like a cavalry saber off the rack nearby, observing the weapon in her hand. "The sword you used to beat Guiche with was bigger than one, wasn't it?"

Lloyd shrugged. "Maybe? I don't know, that was at least a week and a half ago."

"Then get me one that's bigger and a lot thicker," Louise commanded.

"Pardon me, miss, but I believe this sword is the correct size for your-"

"I _said,_ one that is bigger and thicker!"

"Yes, right away," the shopkeeper squeaked, stumbling off into the back room to get Louise out of his face, grumbling to himself. "Stupid noble doesn't know anything...let's see if she's ready for this one…!"

"You know, Louise, I think the guy might have had a point," Lloyd observed. "I'm only eighteen, and I'm not exactly in the shape to be swinging swords bigger than myself. I'm not exactly Cloud Strife, and certainly not Beowulf…"

"Look, it's dangerous that you've gotten Kirche after you," Louise countered. "If you must have a sword to protect yourself with if you don't have access to your cards, I'd rather it be as big as possible, just to stress the point."

"Is that right?" asked Lloyd. "And here I thought you'd be your usual stingy self…"

"Who're you calling stingy!?" Louise snapped. "If I spoil my Familiar, he's going to get used to it! I only provide what is necessary!"

"Necessary being whatever drives the point home to Kirche to keep her soft, warm hands off of me," said Lloyd, unable to resist poking the pink-haired bear just a little bit more. "Well...it'd be more accurate to say her 'soft, warm, _everything_ …'"

"YOU IDIOT!"

Lloyd turned around to meet Louise and her falling wand right as he pulled out a blue card from his deck. " **Stymied Hopes!** " Much as Lloyd calculated, Louise wasn't expecting him to come back around with a counterspell and the spell (and whatever explosion that might have followed) fizzled and died right on her wandtip. "Whoops. Should've let me keep my Myr deck after all, hm?"

Louise simply raised her wand to cast another spell, but by that point the shopkeeper had returned. "Sorry to have kept you waiting. Will this sword do?"

The man held up a golden sword, almost reminiscent of a sword that a certain blonde King of Camelot would have wielded, and those had to be precious gems in the hilt. It was certainly beautiful and definitely nice to see up close, but Lloyd managed to convince himself that it was just a show piece, more than anything, and definitely out of price range. Or maybe Louise had more money than he thought she did…

"It's the best item we have in the store," the man said, unaware of Lloyd's skepticism. "It was forged in the finest ancient traditions by the Germanian alchemist-mage and swordsmith, Sir Schverg de Germania. It cuts through steel ever so easily."

 _The hell it does,_ thought Lloyd.

"How much is it?" asked Louise.

"3000 gold coins."

Lloyd actually winced hearing the price. And Louise's look of absolute shock told him that she wasn't onboard with such a thing. "3000!? You could buy a new house and have a forest for a garden for that!"

"A good sword is worth as much as a castle," the merchant said, turning on the charm, such as it was. "It's a good price if it's just one estate-"

"Yeah no," Lloyd cut in, giving the sword back. "Look, if I need a sword that I can impress a bunch of nobles with for a grand ball, I'll gladly come back and move that merchandise for you. Meanwhile, I'm looking for something a bit more…utilitarian, shall we say? What's the going price of a standard longsword?"

"Around 200 gold, I'd say. Depends on the length, weight, and condition."

Despite Louise frantically shaking her head to tell him she didn't even have anything that close, Lloyd nodded. "200, huh? We can make this work, I think. Show me something around that price."

"Why don't you start with me?"

The three of them jumped at the sound of a new voice, somewhere in the far corner. There, in a barrel with a handful of weapons that had clearly seen better days, was a sword so completely rusted over it was brown and black, instead of the usual orange of rusted iron. The sword jumped a little, moving on its own, and a bit of metal near the hilt was moving, almost like a mouth.

"That's strange! I've never seen a sword do that before!" the shopkeeper said, clearly alarmed.

Lloyd slowly approached the barrel, reaching into it. The sword actually jumped into his hand of its own volition, shooting straight up into the air. "Jesus Christ!"

"Don't worry, buddy! I may be rusted, but I'm still a good sword! Shopkeep over there's been so busy trying to run the golden sword gambit he just leaves me alone to rust in this bargain bin since he bought me from a scrap dealer!" the sword said.

"H-hey!" the shopkeeper started, insulted.

"Well, you must've been sitting around a long time with all the rust on you…I almost don't want to test your edge, I don't remember when my last tetanus shot was," Lloyd observed. He spun the blade experimentally in his hand, hearing the whistle of the sword. "Fairly light, though, and still got some good weight for a sword that's in such poor condition…one way to know for certain, though…" he took the sword in both hands, and then thrust his knee against the blade as hard as he could.

Louise's hands had actually shot to her mouth in horror, but visibly relaxed when nothing happened.

"Still got good bend in the blade, and somehow still stayed one piece somehow. A little bit of elbow grease and this thing'll be perfect," Lloyd continued. "Louise, would you say 100 gold is good enough to move this sword?"

"Oh! Uh, yes! 100 gold would do nicely for this sword!" Louise said, trying to regain her noble composure. "Unfortunately, that's all the money I have on me…"

"But surely you would make a deal for the nice young lady, right?" Lloyd asked expectantly.

* * *

"That was some slick work you put on back there, partner!"

"You can thank my aunt Lynn for that one," Lloyd said proudly. "I learned a few tips from her back when I used to go antiquing with her. Seriously, is that sword as good as he said it was or was he trying to put the moves on us?"

"Oh please. That sword's as fake as can be," the sword said.

"WILL YOU TWO STOP!?" snarled Louise, suddenly rounding on them.

Lloyd put up his hands. "What the hell, Louise?"

"I honestly can't believe you! Talking back to your Master is one thing, but what you did in that store is unconscionable! What if that sword broke? There's no way we would've been able to pay for it then!"

"Says you. I'm not about to shell out for the first piece of junk in price range, and if this guy was trying to pass off junk as a weapon in the hopes of quick cash, then he gets what he deserves."

"Listen to yourself! Just because you're a Familiar with magic no one understands does not give you free reign to do whatever you please!" Louise said, yanking on Lloyd's hoodie to drag him to her level. "It's just like you said: we are _partners_. Equal shares in everything. And any trouble you get into, you're dragging me along for the ride. So you'll forgive me if I tighten the reigns on you to make sure you don't do something stupid."

"Fine, fine," Lloyd said. As Louise let him go, he added, "Though if you don't mind me asking, why did you only have 100 bucks on you? That's kinda poor planning for someone wanting to go on a shopping trip with their Familiar."

"I spent it all on extra expenses," Louise replied.

"Extra expenses? For what?"

"For you. Unless you think I was joking when I said you almost killed yourself winning that duel against Guiche. And before you say anything, it's a thousand years too early for a Familiar to talk back about something their Master has given you, alright?"

Lloyd was silent, actually thinking about Siesta's words earlier. She said Louise had spent a great deal of money to treat his wounds with some really potent elixir she'd ordered. Was that the extra expenses she had mentioned? Lloyd, humbled perhaps for the first time since he had come to Halgekinia, sighed. "Of course." Then he added softly, "dear Master."

* * *

They continued down the road to another store, this one with a sign depicting a spool and thread. Upon entering, they found a woman with her hair in a bun with two large pins tied in it and, in what appeared to in defiance of what other women around town were wearing, was wearing a blouse and simple pants. Lloyd resisted the urge to say, "and feminism marches on..."

"Well, Miss Valliere, good to see you again," the woman said. "Come for another set of uniforms?"

"Yes," Louise grumbled, handing over the tattered remains of her previous uniform from the week before. "I was also kind of hoping maybe you'd help my Familiar with some clothes as well, as he literally came with only the clothes on his back."

Lloyd opened his mouth to correct her, but thought better of it.

"Oh? So you did summon a human Familiar? I thought it was just gossip from the other Academy students when they came to town..." Quinn asked, looking at Lloyd curiously.

"Well, wonder no more," Lloyd said with a smile. "Name's Lloyd Kreis."

"You could at least introduce yourself with some dignity!" Louise snapped at him.

"Oh, it's quite alright," said Quinn. "You two do make quite the interesting pair, after all!"

"I know, right? She can't cast magic at all, I've got the power of the Multiverse at my fingertips. We complete each other," Lloyd said with a cat-like grin.

"Multiverse? What's he going on about?" Quinn asked Louise.

Louise grabbed her wand, desperate to reign in her Familiar for his flippancy.

"Daaaarling…"

Louise immediately turned around, and her face promptly fell. Lloyd turned around, and his jaw dropped. Kirche and Tabitha had finally caught up to them, and in Kirche's hands was the golden sword the shopkeeper had offered them previously. Quinn was looking from Kirche to Louise to Lloyd, wondering what on earth was going on.

"Kirche…what a lovely surprise…" Lloyd said, filling in the empty void of silence in the room.

"What on earth are you doing here, Zerbst!?" Louise asked, practically spitting fire.

"Why, I was in town, and just so happened to find this sword! I thought it would make a wonderful gift for Lloyd for all the services he's rendered to the school!" Kirche said innocently, presenting the golden sword to him. Despite Louise glaring at him in an obvious attempt to dissuade him, Lloyd took the sword, fearing rebuffing the gift would set her off. There was definitely something…weird going on with Kirche, almost like what had happened with Siesta the previous week. Either that, or she was using her fire magic to turn up the heat in the room, but he was getting a distinct smell of ash and smoke, like a volcano had erupted nearby. "I thought it fit Lloyd well."

"I'm very flattered, Kirche, but…we were looking at this sword and the guy tried to sell it to us at 3000 gold coins. How were you able to buy that?"

"Oh, let's just say I have some unique ways of getting a deal…" Kirche said, one finger delicately placed on her bottom lip. That pouty look earned a swift cough and look away from Lloyd, trying hard to not show his embarrassment.

"So her sex appeal is worth 3000 gold, huh? With a figure like that, I'd believe it…" the sword cracked in Lloyd's ear.

"Hush, you…!" Lloyd hissed, trying desperately to maintain his cool.

"I was told the sword was from Germania," Kirche continued, taking the opportunity to badger Louise a bit more. "Germania is known for its swords and its women, isn't it? There's no way a girl from Tristain like you could ever win. Why, everyone in Tristain is so prudish! I'll never understand how you don't explode from all the pent-up tension!"

"Ha! You played around in Germania and got too many people's attention, so you had to come here and study abroad!" Louise countered, trying to look imposing against Kirche, but it was clear the odds were stacked against her. "Besides, I, for one, don't see the need to try and bed every man I see!"

At this point, both girls already had their wands out, glaring daggers at each other, but a sudden gust of wind cut in on the duel, and their wands floated of their hands into the waiting hand of Tabitha. "No dueling indoors."

"Yeah, especially not in a place that's not your own," Lloyd nodded.

Unfortunately, not to be deterred, both girls rounded on Lloyd next. "Lloyd, you have to decide which sword you prefer the best!" Kirche said.

"Whoa, hey, I'm just sitting here…" Lloyd put up his hands.

"Hurry up and make up your mind!" Louise insisted.

Lloyd stepped backward, looking from Louise to Kirche and trying desperately to come up with the right words to say. This was the ultimate catch-22 a guy could face: a choice between two women and either choice promised pain or at least a big scene as one cried foul in the name of righteous indignation. So, he decided on the only wise decision anybody could make in this situation and still come out on top…

"I…choose to plead the Fifth?"

"…what does that even mean? Is that something from Earth?" asked Louise flatly.

"Such a gentleman, as always," Kirche oozed. "But you don't need to hide anything from me, love. After all, we are the same, you and I. Burning in our mutual fires of love!" That's when she reached into her shroud and produced yet another deck of cards.

"She's got a deck, too!" Louise said.

"Kirche, where did you get that?" asked Lloyd slowly.

"Oh, why should that matter?" Kirche said, the smell of ash getting much stronger now. "Just because that maid girl had a deck and went on a destructive rampage at the Academy doesn't mean I won't! Unlike her and the Valliere, I actually am a mage! I have a lot more control over these cards than either of them ever will!"

"I'd like to think so," said Lloyd, shooting a look at Louise to stop her launching herself at Kirche over her statement. "But that's a risk I can't take. Give me the deck."

"You don't trust me? I'm hurt, Lloyd…" said Kirche, giving him that pouty look from the night before. Lloyd looked away, trying not to show that that particular brand of magic was having any leverage on him.

Unfortunately, Louise was also having none of that. "Zerbst, stop trying to put the moves on my Familiar and give him the deck!"

" **Tarfire!** " A blast of fire erupted from the deck, striking Louise and knocking her to the ground.

"Louise!" Lloyd immediately drew his sword and summoned a few cards from his deck, going to defend her from any further magic.

" **Oh, don't worry about her. It's only a small spell, she'll be back on her feet in no time,** " Kirche said, that damning brass echo in her voice. " **Now then, how about we return to the Academy? I'd love to finish what we started last night…"**

"Not happening. Give me the deck, Kirche," Lloyd shook his head.

" **What? Why should I?** " Kirche asked, her playful tone vanishing and replaced with that kind of "hell-hath-no-fury" tone Lloyd was _really_ hoping to avoid.

"Because that deck's messing with your mind, Kirche," Lloyd said slowly. "I don't care what the state of the Zerbst-Valliere rivalry is, the Kirche I know would _never_ throw spells at Louise, especially unprovoked. Please give me the deck, Kirche, and let's settle this as regular people do."

"… **well then,** " Kirche sniffed airily. " **I can tell you're trying to play hard to get. No matter! I'll just have to earn your love the old-fashioned way!** **_Smokebraider!_** " A gout of flame erupted in the room, taking the form of a humanoid shape, its "hair" shifting through the five colors of magic.

"Oh joy…Elementals from Lorwyn…" Lloyd groaned, summoning a card. "Let's take this outside, shall we!? **Spark Jolt!** " A small burst of lightning jumped out of the card, throwing Kirche and her golden sword out of the building. "Miss Quinn, stay here with Louise." As he started going outside as well, an image of a card appeared in his eyes with the activation of the scry ability: Satyr Firedancer. He quickly shook his head, and it flickered out of existence. "Kirche, this doesn't have to be like this! Give me the deck before more people get hurt!"

" **Don't be ridiculous, love! I would never hurt you! Now, I can't say the same for anyone like Louise, but it's not like she understands what we have together…!** " Kirche said.

"And you don't understand what I have with Louise," Lloyd countered. "A purely physical relationship is nice, but it's not my style."

" **You…don't tell me you actually _love_ the Valliere brat?!**"

"I never said that!" Lloyd countered.

" **Don't lie to me! And if you truly love her, then you two can both rot in hell for all I care! Smokebraider, give me power!** " The elemental summoned a curl of flame, turning into a familiar red haze as another card came out of the deck, and then another. " ** _Soulbright Flamekin! Stigma Lasher!_** " Two more gouts of fire erupted, one remaining a burst of flame with a human figure barely visible among the consuming flames, the other turning into a burning skeletal figure armed with a whip in hand.

" **Scouring Sands!** " Lloyd brought another card, unleashing a small sandstorm through the streets. Smokebraider and Soulbright Flamekin cried out and fell under the earthen assault, but the Stigma Lasher remained. "You may have better control of those cards than Siesta did, but I have more game knowledge! You won't win against me, Kirche, so give me your deck and I won't beat you up too badly!" The scry activated again, revealing a **Spellheart Chimera.** With a wave of his hand, the card came out of the deck, orbiting around him.

" **Die for me, Lloyd!** **Die for breaking my heart! _Everlasting Torment!_** " Kirche's response was to hold up a card. Immediately, the bright afternoon sky began to dim, the whole area around them shifting as though a cheap day-to-night filter had come over the town, lit only by the flames of the Stigma Lash that was still on the field. At once, the Stigma Lasher shot at him, striking him with his whip and sending him flying into the doorjamb of the tailor shop.

"Welp…there goes my ability to heal…" Lloyd coughed, struggling to his feet. Tabitha quickly helped him up the rest of the way, followed by Sylphid. "Tabitha, where did she get the deck from? Do you know?"

"No."

"Come on! You two came here together, right? You had to have seen something, anything!"

"No. Sorry."

"At least tell me you'll help me."

"Yes." Tabitha stretched out her hand, and her long, crook-like staff shot to her hand. "Plan?"

"Well, the best I've got is protect me and disrupt her spellcasting. Don't let her use any of the cards she gets in her hands. Got it?"

"Understood." Tabitha nodded, then made her way outside with Sylphid, spinning her staff and awaiting the next attack.

" **And now you're going to side with him, Tabitha? Why!?** " Kirche asked.

"You're acting strange. Those cards are probably to blame. Give Lloyd the deck."

" **You can't be serious!** " Kirche said. Upon getting no answer to the contrary, she summoned another card. " **Well, if you're going to throw your lot in with him, then I'll show you where that will take you! Puncture Bolt!** " However, nothing happened when she thrust the card out. " **What?** "

"I told you, Kirche. I know this game better than you, and that's why I'm going to beat you!" Lloyd said, taking the Spellheart Chimera he'd added earlier with the scry ability. " **Spellheart Chimera!** " A bearded goat with wings galloped into the fray, bleating as it scraped the ground with its hooves. "Tabitha, you ready? Be ready to disarm her!"

"Ready."

 **(BGM – Ballroom Blitz, Sweet)**

" **This will hurt me more than it'll hurt you!** " Kirche said, pulling out another card. " ** _Spitebellows! Evocation!_ " **A horrific thing shot out of the ground, with four spider-like legs, five heads (four of which were on its back) and no eyes to speak of, and unleashed a hail of fire in all directions, swallowing Lloyd's Chimera whole. " ** _Flame Jab!_** "

"Tabitha, now!" At Lloyd's command, Tabitha summoned a chilly gust of wind around her as Kirche's spell took effect, and a small explosion of fire erupted from the sword in Lloyd's hand, forcing him to drop it. "YEOWCH!"

"Well! That was new!" The sword observed from the ground. However, as Lloyd went to pick it up, he noticed that, somehow, a bit of the rust that had been on the sword was gone, and true steel was poking through.

Tabitha, meanwhile, used her wind spell to try and blow the cards out of Kirche's hand. However, while the cards did take flight, they suddenly stopped in mid air and formed back into a pile in her deck. "Tch...Sylphid."

Sylphid immediately went after Kirche, flying as fast as it could go, but the Stigma Lasher suddenly got in the way, smacking the dragon down with its flaming whip. The dragon collapsed on the ground, screeching in pain.

"This is not working out...I'd feel better if I had my Myr deck..." Lloyd grunted. " **Archaeomancer!** " A hooded old man in yellow robes appeared on the field, blue mana swirling around his hands. Turning to Lloyd, the mana coalesced into a copy of **Stymied Hopes.**

" ** _Glarewielder! Evocation!_** " Another humanoid figure of flame appeared, its flames bright yellow. It roared as it unleashed its fire in all directions, blinding both Tabitha and Lloyd's Archaeomancer. " ** _Mirror Sheen!_** " Kirche's body began to shimmer with light, as though a thin veneer of glass had come over her body. The Stigma Lasher then moved, going after Tabitha next.

"Oh no you don't!" Lloyd got in the way, rusted sword raised. The Stigma Lasher struck him once again, stinging welts appearing on his skin.

"You're not kidding when you said this isn't working out..." The sword quipped.

"You're not helping!" Lloyd snapped at it. Strangely enough, another bit of rust had come off the blade, revealing more steel underneath. "Tabitha!"

"I'm okay..." Tabitha said softly. Sylphid had managed to come back to her, and Tabitha was trying to heal her Familiar's wounds, to no avail. "Something's wrong. Her wounds won't heal. You have an explanation?"

"It's this Everlasting Torment spell," said Lloyd. "All damage dealt by either party is permanent. It's an ability called _Wither_."

"Permanent?" Tabitha gave him a withering glare of her own.

"Yeah, but I think if we beat Kirche and take her deck, the wither damage should go away," Lloyd said quickly. _That's the hope, at least,_ Lloyd added in his mind, but he kept that part to himself. "But, while she is powerful, she lacks any kind of foresight or reason to her moves. We could use that to our advantage."

"What do you mean?"

"Just keep her busy. I'll give you a signal on when to attack," said Lloyd, summoning two more cards out of his deck. " **Flamespeaker Adept! Sigiled Skink!** " The white-robed mage appeared before Lloyd once again, and it was followed by a small lizard, red and black with mystic runes wrapped around its scales.

" **Do you think summoning such weak creatures will be able to save you from my flames?** " Kirche said, summoning cards of her own. " ** _Flamekin Bladewhirl!_** " Another humanoid flame appeared, this one black with red flames forming khatars over its arms. A card in her hand shot up and revealed itself to be an **Incandescent Soulstoke.** " ** _Incandescent Soulstoke!_** " The revealed monster, yet another humanoid flame in burning robes and a wooden staff in hand, also appeared on the field. Both Bladewhirl and Stigma Lasher suddenly burned hotter, and Stigma Lasher moved once again, trying to go after Lloyd this time.

"Archaeomancer!" Lloyd's blue wizard moved in the way of the Stigma Lasher. One whip lash later, the wizard disappeared from sight.

 _She's got one mana up. If I could just get an opportunity where she has no mana at all and no creatures to block with, I can send in Tabitha to attack when she can't cast magic to defend herself! But how am I supposed to get her to use her spells in a predictable way?_

"You know, partner, I don't really think this is how couples are supposed to suss out all of their problems," Lloyd's sword snarked. "You could at least try to hear her problems out..."

"Are we really going to do this now? Now?!" Lloyd snapped at his sword, but suddenly, his sword's words gave him a brilliant idea. **"Wall of Frost!"** Lloyd's next card out was, as the name suggested, a large wall of ice, blocking Kirche from reaching Louise and raising Lloyd and Tabitha over her as well as much of the town. "Kirche, if this how you wanted to earn my love, this isn't it!"

" **It's a little late for apologies, Lloyd!** "

"You told me your door would always be open to me, Kirche! I know you still believe that!" Lloyd insisted. "But if you want me to be on the other side, Kirche, you have to give this up! I don't give my heart out lightly...unlike you."

Kirche glared at him. " **What did you say?** "

"Partner, what are you doing?" The sword asked. "I said you should hear her problems out, not taunt her with them!"

"We all know the reason why you're so big on trying to get all the guys to like you. It's got nothing to do with Germania versus Tristain, and we all know you're not trying to get one up on Louise!" Lloyd said, spinning the sword in his hand. "No, we all know you're doing this because you're lonely. You're all alone in a foreign country and the only way out of your problems is exactly as Louise said: with as much sex as possible."

" **You insolent cur! To think I ever tried to defend you from Louise!** "

"That's because you don't understand what it is I have with Louise, but when have you ever cared about anyone without strings attached? You may have the body of Aphrodite, but you've got a nasty streak like Hera. And that is not the girl for me."

Kirche looked positively enraged now. " **THAT DOES IT! Incandescent Soulstoke, manifest!** " The Soulstoke obeyed, taking Kirche's mana and creating a massive wall of flame. And from that flame came a horrifying red creature with whip-like tentacles, at least eight based on what was visible, came out of the creature. " **Behold my _Hateflayer!_** "

 **(BGM Stops)**

"Oooh, I wasn't expecting that..." groaned Lloyd.

"Told you," the sword grunted.

"Shut up."

" ** _Heat Shimmer!_** " Suddenly, a ghostly shimmer came over the Hateflayer, and a second one split off from the first. " **Now you're going to feel all the pain you've just inflicted on me now! _Heartlash Cinder!_** " A black flame creature with a red flaming whip appeared with the rest. " **Chroma Blast!** "

"Chroma!? Oh god why-" The Cinder unleashed its whip, wrapping around Lloyd's arm, and a searing flash of pain, like getting sunburnt in a single instant, flashed across his body, and down he went again. "Did I not expect...Chroma cards in a Lorwyn deck...!?"

"Lloyd!"

Lloyd turned his head, and through the haze of flame and pain attempting to crowd out his eyes, he saw Louise's pink hair poking through Quinn's doorway, even as the tailor tried to pull her away.

" **DIE!** " The two Hateflayers converged on him, followed closely by the **Flamekin Bladewhirl.**

 **(BGM Change: These Hands of Mine Burn With a Roar! - Gundam Build Fighters TRY OST)**

Lloyd suddenly galvanized himself to action, his runes blazing to life. "BLOCK!" The Wall of Frost rose even higher, intercepting one of the Hateflayers easily as Lloyd jumped off the wall, skidding down the massive ice shelf as the Hateflayer's tentacles struck against it, pieces of ice flying everywhere but still holding. Then, he took a second card from his deck. " **Fated Conflagration!** " A massive gout of flame erupted from Lloyd's sword, taking out the second. The Flamespeaker Adept made its move, going after the Bladewhirl and striking it down with flames of its own. Two more cards appeared before Lloyd: **Arbiter of the Ideal** and **Riddle of Lightning.**

 _That's...this'll do it!_

He grasped at Riddle of Lightning and returned Arbiter of the Ideal to his deck.

"Look at you, getting your second wind all of a sudden!"

"Thank the runes. Seem to give me a...wait, what's going on with you!?" Lloyd looked down at his sword, and was quite surprised to find that his sword was no longer rusted. In fact, it looked a lot like a normal sword, with a brass hilt and an almost-brand-new steel blade.

"That bit of magic you used completely blew the rust off of me! I feel like I'm full of energy now!" The sword replied happily.

"Alright! Let's get back control of the board!" Lloyd said, spinning his sword in his hand once again as he pointed at Kirche. "Tabitha! Remember what our plan was!? This is it!"

" **You think I'll just let you attack me when you're at such a close range! _Fiery Bombardment!_ " **Kirche suddenly grabbed her Heartlash Cinder by the head and thrust it forward. " **Prepare yourself!** "

Nothing happened.

" **What!? Why won't this spell work?! Explode and destroy him!** "

"I know why..." Lloyd said in a pretty good impression of Kirche's teasing tone. "You're out of gas."

" **Out of...?** " Kirche began, and upon looking down, she realized what he meant: she was out of mana. " **Huh!?** "

"Flamespeaker! Sigiled Skink!" Lloyd's two remaining creatures shot forward, Sigiled Skink showing him **Arbiter of the Ideal** once again.

 _Perfect!_

Heartlash Cinder was thrust forward by Kirche to intercept the Skink, but Lloyd quickly galvanized into action. " **Riddle of Lightning!** " The Arbiter of the Ideal card he'd put back suddenly appeared, combining with the sorcery. " **Charge 6!** " The card sparked with white-violet lightning, and at such a close range Kirche was blown back a good twenty yards.

" **This isn't over...Hateflayer!** " Kirche cried out when she looked up, both of her Hateflayers were gone. " **What!?** "

"I told you earlier, Kirche! You may have better control over your cards, for what it's worth, but your lack of game knowledge is how I'll beat you!" Lloyd said, as Flamespeaker Adept, empowered by the Sigiled Skink's Scry ability, unleashed as stream of fire at Kirche from point-blank range.

Unlike with the Riddle of Lightning, Kirche didn't even flinch.

"...um, why aren't you rolling on the ground?" Lloyd asked slowly.

" **You forget! I'm a Triangle-class fire mage! Your flames don't burn me!** " Kirche said.

"Then what about wind?" Lloyd asked.

Kirche screamed as another chilly wind blew across the battlefield, wrapping up Kirche in green-colored bindings, courtesy of Tabitha, riding on the still-injured-but-ready Sylphid. Just as Lloyd expected she'd do. "I have her, Lloyd."

" _Gracias!_ " Lloyd said, quickly pulling the disabled Kirche to him.

" **Lloyd, don't-!** "

"This'll hurt me more than it does you," Lloyd quipped, and he wrenched the deck from Kirche's hand. Kirche fell unconscious to the ground, red mana shooting off harmlessly into the air as the Incandescent Soulstoke, Fiery Bombardment, and Everlasting Torment spells faded away. Finally, the battle was over and another deck had been secured.

"We won," sighed Tabitha.

"Thank friggin' God..." nodded Lloyd.

 **(BGM Ends)**

* * *

Kirche was unconscious for at least another couple of hours. There was no lasting harm done to the rest of the town during the fight, save for maybe a couple of torched rooftops, but those fires were quickly doused before they got any worse. The damage dealt to Sylphid had managed to fade away, but the stinging welts on Lloyd's body did not. Louise, thankfully was unharmed, as was Miss Quinn, but unfortunately her store was in quite a shambles, due to pieces of the Wall of Frost crashing into her store from the fight.

"I'm really sorry about this..." Lloyd groaned apologetically.

"You'd better be!" huffed Louise, who was taking a washcloth to Lloyd's injuries, and he was certain she was being rough with him as another punishment. "I understand you were trying to protect me, but you could've at least tried to protect me without destroying the store!"

"You're welcome," Lloyd quipped. Louise pressed harder. "Ow! Ow! Okay! I'm sorry! Stop that, will ya!?"

"It's quite alright," Quinn said, although her tone told Lloyd she was still quite upset with the circumstances. "All those orders destroyed...oh, I may have to take a loan and Turenne may never leave me alone...!"

"Turenne? Who's he?"

"Chillian Turenne's the local tax collector. Unfortunately, he also has connections with the major moneylenders in town, and he'll jack up the interest rates and milk me for all I'm worth just to keep his purse full. I'll be in debt forever!"

Now Lloyd was even more guilty about how everything had panned out. He sat in the chair, looking over at Kirche, being treated by Tabitha, to the destroyed store, to Quinn about ready to break down and cry. He looked into his reflection in his new sword, and the remains of his tattered hoodie hanging off his shoulders. It wasn't rock bottom by a long chalk, but it sure felt like it.

"Look...I'll try to find a way to help pay for the damages..." Lloyd began.

"Oh, I couldn't. You saved our lives out there, I couldn't possibly impose..."

"I'm serious. I can't have you dealing with this by yourself. If I could have my jacket fixed, I could pawn it off or..." Lloyd suddenly stopped, standing up stock-straight. "Hey! I just had an idea!"

"Oh?" His sword asked, curiously.

"It'd better not be like what happened in the sword shop..." Louise growled.

"No, this is legit, just hear me out!" Lloyd said, turning to Quinn. "Look. I need a new wardrobe, especially since my clothes didn't exactly survive my last two fights. If you could make me a new set, though, I could use that as free advertising for you!"

"Adver-what...?" Louise asked.

"I mean, if all goes well, people are going to ask me where I got my clothes made, and I just direct them to you! You might have to take a loan, sure, but the spike in business could help you offset your losses!" Lloyd continued. "...it's worth a shot, at least."

"Miss Quinn, don't listen to him. My Familiar's kind of an idiot," Louise ocuntered. "I could write a letter to my sister Cattelya, and maybe she could convince my family to help you..." She sounded a little unsure about that part, though.

"Oh, nonsense!" Quinn said. "Your Familiar saved us, and if he wants new clothes, then I'll gladly repay my debt to him with that. It's the least I can do, really."

"Excellent!" said Lloyd happily. "...say, do you do custom designs?"


	4. Tristain Academy's Got Talent?

**Hey everyone! HQ here!**

 **Sorry it took so long for this story to get updated. But I'm only two months removed from graduation, so school will be taking up eighty to ninety percent of my time until around halfway through June. On top of this, I've got a few other projects I've been meaning to finish, including The Bizarre Adventure At Magic High School and a new project I'm working with some of my fellow writers on.**

 **In the meantime, please read and enjoy!**

* * *

 **Turn 04: Tristain Academy's Got Talent?**

Voidday finally ended, and school resumed with nobody being the wiser. Sure, other students who went into town on the weekend heard rumors about how some fire mage was going around throwing magic on Voidday, but no one had been able to identify that it was Kirche, and for that matter, nobody would've been able to believe that a fire mage could conjure living beings of fire like that. Unfortunately for Lloyd, she had no information to give about where she'd gotten the Elemental deck from, and he hadn't told anyone about it, even Siesta. In other words, everything was just as mysterious as it had been after Siesta's attack.

That wasn't to say it was a complete loss, however. As per his original agreement with Quinn, Lloyd had gotten a new set of clothes for helping her out. This was the first of his designs, and it was based on his Myr deck: a white shirt with a long red duster coat, with a silver hem around the sleeves. On his right arm just below his shoulder, was the symbol of Mirrodin Besieged, the two combined symbols of Mirrodin and Phyrexia. He was quite pleased with the result, and much as he'd expected, more than a few guys and even the girls were asking about who'd crafted such a piece. Hopefully, Quinn was happy, too.

Then, Louise dropped another bombshell on him.

"We've got a what coming up?"

"It's the Exhibition Festival. It's a mandatory event for all second years to participate in, and it's basically meant to showcase all the new Familiars," Louise said.

"Oh, so it's like a talent show," Lloyd mused, nodding to himself. "…so wait, that means we gotta come up with something, don't we?"

"Well, you're the magician, what on earth am I supposed to do?" Louise huffed.

"Don't be such a child. Simple problems call for simple solutions."

"How on earth is this a simple problem!?"

"Look. I've got three decks here," Lloyd said, gesturing to the table where his three decks were. "And each one is about as unique as it gets. If I'm supposed to put my Planeswalker powers on display, I just take a deck and show what I can do with it! Of course, I could always try to serenade the crowd like I was doing last week…"

"NO! YOU'RE NOT DOING THAT AGAIN!"

"Come on! You can't just shoot down every idea I have! Unless maybe you had one, after all…?"

Louise seethed. Once again, Lloyd had a point: with all the craziness going on, and rumors that even the Princess herself would be attending this year's festival, she didn't want to leave anything to chance. But she really didn't want to give him any more leeway than he already had with that sword. Speaking of which, that sword was just as annoying as her Familiar, and like her Familiar it appeared to even resist basic attempts at control, and even had the audacity to blow a raspberry at her (well, what passed for a raspberry) while Lloyd was leaving with him. And attempts at blowing it up only made Lloyd start throwing lightning bolts around, thinking she was attacking him again. Colbert had to come and sort the whole thing out.

"Fine! Just practice somewhere you won't be seen!"

"Thank you," Lloyd said with a grin. Already ideas were going through his head about what to do next.

Then, Louise's tone softened inexplicably. "Lloyd…when you were fighting Kirche, you said something about 'game knowledge.' What were you talking about?"

Lloyd took a seat at the table and reached for his Myr deck. "Well, I did say that my cards come from a card game, after all. Nobody here has even heard of these cards as far as I can tell, and despite a few big differences, my magic still acts within the rules of the game. I suspect that Kirche, despite being possessed by a deck, lacked the same knowledge, hence why I could beat her. Same for Siesta, although the deck's heavy reliance on scrying might have helped her make better decisions."

"So there's more to your magic than just colors and cards?"

"Oh, absolutely," Lloyd said brightly, already warming to the subject. He took out his Myr deck and began shuffling it. "The game itself is relatively simple, at least the parts about playing the game. There's all sorts of different rules between all the cards and situations, but that's all mostly on a need-to-know basis. Strip that all away and the game is easy."

Louise promptly took the other chair. "Okay then. Teach me."

"…what?" Lloyd asked flatly.

"If I'm going to get a true sense of your powers as a Familiar or a Planeswalker or whatever you want to refer to yourself as, then I should learn how to play the game. If I see things the way you do, it should cause less confusion, right?" Lloyd was genuinely surprised at Louise's request, and the thing was that Louise was bright red, like she'd just asked him out on a date. "…s-stop staring! Are you going to teach me or what!?"

Lloyd chuckled. "Settle down, settle down, I'm just messing with you. So here's how it is…"

* * *

Siesta slowly wandered the halls of the Academy, wondering where the noises were coming from. Students had been complaining of strange noises coming from one of the unused rooms all day, saying it was either music or groaning, followed by someone shouting. Against her better judgment, Siesta had volunteered to go investigate by herself. The other maids weren't so keen, worried that she would end up going on another spree through the Academy. Siesta couldn't blame them; she'd be worried too.

And she was. Sort of.

The whole situation with Keranos had been an experience she didn't want to relive again. The very thought of something magical and possibly halfway sentient, if Lloyd's explanation was true, somehow controlling her mind and wreaking destruction on the school for Tristain's elite made her skin crawl. But for as much as it scared her, she wanted to know more about it. There was also that small, dark part of the back of her mind that maybe wanted a proper crack at that magic, just so she could have a real chance at improving her station.

She put it out of her head. It was too dangerous. She got lucky the last time, she may not be again.

"Guys, come on!"

Siesta blinked. Was that Lloyd? Upon noticing she was right in front of the room where everyone agreed the noise was coming from, she slowly opened the door, and was promptly greeted with the sight of chaos. Lloyd's Myrs, about twenty in total, were in various places around room, standing in rows on top of the desks. Most of them appeared to be standard steel variety, with the Gold, Iron, and Palladium Myrs front and center. There was also a Myr made of brass, bigger and bulkier than most of other Myrs combined, in the far row towards the back. And Lloyd himself was in the center of the room, a piece of parchment in front of him and a flute in his hands backwards, muttering something.

All at once, Lloyd's Myrs turned their heads towards her, almost like an army. Siesta almost turned and ran, fearing reprisal. "Sorry, I'll leave if I'm disturbing you!"

Lloyd looked up to find his maid friend in the doorway, and instead waved her in. "Hardly. Come on in, I need a break from trying to control the zoo I'm trying to turn into a choir," he said.

"A zoo...into a choir?" Siesta asked, looking at the gathered Myrs.

"It's part of my show for the Exhibition Festival. Those steel ones are called Myr Propagators. If I infuse them with mana, they clone themselves. The idea is that if I get enough mana, I can clone the clones and eventually I'll reach the number I need to get the best effect. The problem is that controlling twenty of...well, just about anything all at once is a _lot_ harder than I thought it'd be. Especially with that big Lodestone Myr in the back I'm trying to use as the percussion. He couldn't keep a secret, let alone the beat."

The bulky brass Myr in the back merely shrugged and gave a low groaning sound.

" _Yeah, we get it's hard. But try harder!_ " His sword called out from his position on Lloyd's back.

Siesta stared at the sword in surprise, her jaw agape. "...did your sword just talk?"

"Yeah, he does that," Lloyd sighed.

" _Yup! I am the legendary sword Derflinger, at your service!_ " the sword said proudly. " _So, who is this, partner?_ "

"This is Siesta," Lloyd said. "She's a maid and a good friend of mine."

" _Oh, you must be that maid girl that the redhead mentioned in town yesterday! Well, I gotta admit, partner, you sure know how to pick 'em._ "

"Derf, if I want a comment on my love life, I'll give it to you."

" _Well, truthfully, talking about that seems to be a lot easier than getting these 'Myrs' of yours to sing!_ "

"How can a Myr sing, exactly? If they are made of metal, how do they breathe?" asked Siesta.

"They don't. But I can pass it off as singing because of how they communicate. Watch this," Lloyd pointed the flute at the Gold Myr. "Gold, give me a low C. Like this." He put the flute to his lips and blew out a note. The Gold Myr raised its head and gave a humming sound, matching the tone perfectly. "Iron, give me a G, higher up." He blew out another note, and the Iron Myr also matched the tone. "And Palladium, give me a high C, round out the octave." Once again, the Myr and Lloyd matched up in tone.

"That's amazing...!" Siesta breathed. It was almost surreal.

"See, individual control of a Myr is easy. But when you add Myrs on Myrs on Myrs singing in different tones, they either drop off or start falling flat. I get maybe a few good bars in, but beyond that I can't do crap with these guys," Lloyd explained.

Siesta hummed in understanding, looking down at the parchment he had on the table. The parchment had notes written on it, so it was probably the tune. There was a lot of scratches and blots on the paper, so it was clear he wasn't used to writing on it yet. "Well, obviously you can three Myrs separately. Perhaps maybe you need to think of these Myrs as individuals as well."

Lloyd opened his mouth, ready to dismiss the idea, but then closed it. It made sense. He had twenty Myrs out and they all obeyed him when he focused on them, but he couldn't get them to stay in tune if he thought of them as one great big group. An idea quickly popped into his head, and he grabbed a nearby piece of chalk, drawing out a single bar, and then three notes: a simple C chord. "Gold, Iron, Palladium. On three. One, two..."

He blew into the flute, imagining the sound of three notes all at once. Gold and Iron found their mark, but Palladium wavered a little, muddling the sound. Then, he quickly drew up two more bars, erased the chord on the first, and wrote up the rest of the chord with the Myr's name next to it on the other two. "And again. One, two..."

The chord came out a harmonic hum that seemed to fill the entire classroom. Lloyd lowered the flute, completely in awe of what he just discovered. And Siesta was the one who came up with the idea in the beginning. "Siesta...that just about saved my hide..."

Siesta giggled. Magic or no magic, she was still helpful after all, it seemed.

* * *

Lloyd spent the rest of the week either doing Louise's chores or out in the field with the Myr's. Siesta's suggestion had proven to be quite the breakthrough. He'd spent the time putting the notes on paper and testing it to make sure it held up under scrutiny. He'd gone from maybe two or three Myrs staying in harmony to about eight. And once he'd decided on his piece, he figured he'd only need about six to make it work anyway. Now it was just a matter of getting all on paper and practicing for the event. It'd be hard, yes, but it was now more on the time-consuming side of hard instead of being just difficult.

"The princess has arrived!"

Lloyd looked up, hearing some students chattering excitedly as they ran past. Curious, Lloyd dismissed the Myr Propagator and the four clones he'd summoned for practice and quickly followed them to the front of the school. Already there was a huge crowd forming, and he had to jump to spot Louise's pink hair among the crowd. "Louise!"

"Lloyd." Louise observed plainly.

"...huh. Was expecting something more, there. What's this I hear about a princess?"

"Isn't it obvious? The princess is coming to the Academy and we're all here to see her!"

"I knew that! I was just wondering about the occasion?"

"Oh, you didn't know?" Guiche asked from nearby. "The princess is actually here for the Exhibition Festival!"

Lloyd slowly turned towards Louise, rather irked at being left in the dark about this surprise VIP. "...and the reason nobody told me about this _because..._?"

"Now entering, Her Highness, Princess Henrietta de Tristain!"

A maid was first out of the carriage, holding open the door for her lady to step through.

And what a lady she was.

She was a young woman with purple hair, closer to maroon than anything, with beautiful blue eyes. Her dress was white, with what appeared to be sapphires set in the dress's sleeves, a choker around her neck, and a simple crown, and garbed around her shoulders was a purple mantle. And yet, compared to all the nobles he'd been around, who carried an authoritarian air and had a snobby attitude to match, this woman had an aura of peace and justice that was impressive, considering she was probably not much taller than Louise. Maybe a difference of two or three feet, if at that.

"Oh, how lovely the princess is!" Like clockwork, Guiche was already fawning over her.

"That's the princess? I'm better looking than her, and I've got the figure to prove it. Don't you agree, Tabitha?" Like clockwork, Kirche was already sizing her up.

"Don't know." Like clockwork, Tabitha didn't really seem to care, her nose in yet another book.

" _How about it, partner? Like what you see?_ " Derf asked.

"Ooooh yeah..." Lloyd said, too caught up in the moment to recognize what the sword had asked him.

Too bad Louise did. She promptly smacked Lloyd right at the base of his spine with a right fist. "You should be quiet about her appearance! Planeswalker or no, you're still just a Familiar, so don't be rude!"

"Gah! Stop that, you're gonna paralyze me one day!" Lloyd looked up, massaging his already bruising back, just in time to see a second figure get out of the carriage right behind the princess. She appeared to be dressed as a knight much like the other four that were meant to serve as her entourage, with traditional white armor, but it was actually much lighter, centered only on her chest and a pair of greaves. She appeared to carry no weapons either, and instead seemed to give off a smell of flowers, almost like the field he'd been practicing in. Something was off, but also incredibly familiar at the same time.

" _Partner? What's up?_ "

"I don't know," Lloyd muttered. "But keep an eye on that one if you can. She's giving off a certain vibe, if you know what I mean."

For once, Derf didn't try to crack a joke. " _You got it._ "

Henrietta made her way up to the front steps of the Academy, where Headmaster Osmond and the rest of the faculty were already waiting on bended knee. "I welcome you to our Academy, Your Highness."

"I am sorry for the sudden visit, Headmaster. Please forgive my selfishness." Even her voice was beautiful.

"Do not be. We have been waiting for your arrival with all of the students for you!"

"Well, I wanted to see this year's exhibition with my own eyes."

"And why would that be?"

"It's a personal reason. That's all I can say at this point."

"Huh. Curiouser and curiouser..." Lloyd muttered.

* * *

"It's about time you showed up! I've been waiting for hours!"

"Well pardon me, I just wanted to make sure I got in everything I could before the big day tomorrow," said Lloyd, dropping the sheaf of parchment that was his composition notes on the table. "You'll be happy to hear that we're just about ready for showtime tomorrow, I hope?"

"Just so long as you don't embarrass me," Louise grumbled.

" _Don't be so antagonistic. Partner's got this in the bag!_ " Derf said as Lloyd put him on the ground next to his pile of hay.

There was a knock on the door, thankfully stopping the sword and Louise from going any further. Lloyd looked at his master. "Were we expecting guests?"

"Not this late at night," Louise said, giving Lloyd an expectant look.

"Maybe someone should go answer it," Lloyd said.

Derf gave a grunt of noncommittal. Louise just continued staring. Lloyd groaned and eventually stood up. "Fine, don't get up all at once." He made his way to the door and opened it. "Yes? Can we help-" A cloaked figure suddenly dashed in through the opening, closing the door just as quickly. "-well okay then, guess I'm not needed."

"Don't be rude, Lloyd!" Louise said, getting up with her riding crop in hand. "Who are you?"

"...well, it has been a while."

Louise lowered the crop, recognizing the voice. Then, the figure's cloak came down, revealing the crowned head of Princess Henrietta de Tristain as she embraced Louise out of nowhere. "Louise Francoise!"

"Wait, isn't that the..." Lloyd began.

" _Well! Looks like you lucked out, partner! The girl gets to come to you!_ "

"Shut up!" Lloyd snapped at him.

"I wanted to see you for so long," Henrietta said. "I really missed you!"

"Princess, you shouldn't have come here! This abode is too humble for you to grace with your presence!" Louise quickly separated herself from Henrietta and took a knee in respect.

"Oh, stop it, Louise. We've been friends since we were little girls! You don't have to worry about formalities with me."

"So wait, you two are childhood friends?" Lloyd quickly leaned in on the conversation. "Suddenly things make a lot more sense."

"Yes. I had the honor of being the Princess's royal playmate and close companion," Louise explained.

"I prefer to think of us as childhood friends," Henrietta said, quickly wiping at something in her eye.

"Are you crying?" asked Louise.

"I'm sorry. I haven't had a chance to talk to anyone openly since my father passed away, so I've been quite lonely."

"Ouch," Lloyd observed, taking a seat at the table. "Been there, done that."

Louise quickly shoved him to the ground. "You stay quiet, Lloyd! And you should be on your knees before the princess! Have some respect!"

"It's alright, Louise. I don't mind," Henrietta said with a smile that was so cute it almost melted Lloyd's heart on sight.

"You flatter me, Your Highness..." Lloyd said.

Louise drove his head into the ground again. "Stop staring at her like that! Your Highness, please forgive him. His behavior leaves a lot to be desired, and I've been trying my best to keep him in line."

"Like how you dealt with Keranos, the God of Storms?" Henrietta smiled.

Lloyd actually felt his heart drop into his stomach and then bungee right into his throat. "Wait, you knew!?"

"Of course. I had to meet the man who had saved a maid from being possessed by an evil spirit. Apparently he'd been masquerading as a god from an ancient pantheon of a country far beyond the mountains to the east," Henrietta said, taking a knee before the prone Lloyd. "I really wanted to see such a brave Familiar for myself."

Lloyd sighed. Apparently she was aware, but only in the capacity of the cover story he'd given Professor Colbert and Old Man Osmond. Plus, she was actually impressed by his feat, so that was always a plus. "Again, you flatter me..."

"A lot of people didn't really believe it. They thought it was just some clever excuse the Academy thought up. It definitely caused a stir once I got involved, but I convinced everyone that it was just an isolated incident."

"So you're the reason why no one thought too hard on it?" asked Lloyd. "Wow, I just...I'm speechless..." _Holy crap, is this what love feels like?_

"Oh, Your Highness! We can't nearly thank you enough!" Louise said, bowing her head as she drove Lloyd's head into the floor again.

Henrietta giggled. "I think you've summoned a splendid Familiar, Louise."

"On the contrary! Summoning this rude, awful creature is the biggest mistake of my life!"

"You're not supposed to talk like that about someone especially when they're not even a foot away from you OW!" Louise shoved Lloyd back into the floor again. "Don't make me zap you!"

* * *

After spending some time to catch up with Louise and her Familiar, Henrietta quickly snuck back into the room she'd been given upon her arrival at the Academy. It felt good to finally speak to someone that wouldn't attempt to use her conversations as political leverage. Her mother had cautioned her against saying something to anyone at this point in time, especially with the regency council going on while Cardinal Mazarin took the role of regent of the throne. Despite her young age, it was almost a forgone conclusion she was to take the throne, something she didn't really have to deal with at the moment. She would still take it, but she'd prefer it not to come for a while yet.

"You're awfully late getting to bed, Princess."

Henrietta gave a squeak of surprise at the voice, but soon found it was the female knight from earlier. "Oh, Sir Sonya...I wasn't expecting you to be there...!"

"Then I'm doing my job right," Sonya said with a shrug.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to sneak away. I just...I needed some time to myself..."

"Don't worry about it. Your secret's safe with me," she said. "But answer me this first: that Familiar, the one who stopped Keranos. Did he have a deck on him?"

Henrietta tapped her chin, trying to think back on the conversation. "...actually, yes. He did have one on his person at the time."

Sonya grinned, cracking her knuckles. "Then he's definitely the one I'm looking for. Hopefully he's not too secretive, and if he is...well, then I've got ways around that."

"I don't think that'll be necessary, Sonya. He's quite cordial, despite all Louise Francoise said about him. I'm sure if you approach him nicely he'll be more than happy to answer your questions."

"One can only hope," Sonya said, spinning a white and blue deck case on its corner on the table.

* * *

The Exhibition Festival kicked off at noon the next day. There was a palpable buzz from the first and third years in the crowd while a tent had been set up for Henrietta and Sonya off to the side. As they waited around, something caught Lloyd's attention.

"So, this is where you were, brother."

"Eep! Lamarc! What are you doing here?"

Guiche had been practicing with his Familiar, the giant mole Verdandi, off in the corner, but another blonde male had shown up, looking rather displeased. He certainly had a lot of similarities to Guiche in appearance, although he was taller with straight hair to Guiche's waves. He was also dressed in the armor of a knight, but his was rather different compared to the standard armor of Henrietta's entourage from the night before. And clearly Guiche was not enjoying being in his presence. Lloyd quickly looked away, hoping Lamarc didn't see his face.

"I heard you got involved in a duel last week and lost," Lamarc said coldly. "And you had to lose to some commoner, of all people. Do you have any idea the kind of suffering I had to go through the rest of the week? Just because the princess decided the matter had been closed doesn't mean you'll be getting away free."

"Please understand, brother! This commoner isn't really a commoner! He used magic no one's ever seen before! I had no means to counter it!"

"A commoner using magic? Do you take me for a fool, brother? I was not named Captain of the Griffon Knight Corps for nothing. You may only be the fourth son of the Gramont family, but any stain left on this family left by your foolishness reflects on us all."

"Don't be ridiculous! You could ask him yourself! See, there he is, next to Louise de Valliere!"

Lloyd winced, trying to keep himself from looking in their direction. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough as Lamarc promptly made his way over, sizing up the tall swordsman before him. "Are you the one who defeated my brother in that duel the week before?"

Lloyd sighed. "Yeah, that was me. What of it?"

Lamarc frowned. "This is the one who defeated you? What foolishness."

" _You're not all that impressive yourself!_ "

"What was that?" Lamarc suddenly rounded on Lloyd, a penetrating glare in his eyes.

"Goddammit," groaned Lloyd. He knew bringing Derf would come back to bite him in the ass.

"You have a lot of nerve, speaking to your better in such a fashion," Lamarc said, hand going for his sword. "Perhaps you're in need of a proper lesson."

"I'm not looking for a fight," Lloyd countered. "In case you haven't noticed, the Exhibition Festival is about to kick off, and the last thing we need right now is backstage violence."

"Then you should have kept your mouth shut."

"Fair enough. But, let me offer an alternative. Seeing as Louise and I are the last duo up, I'll be showcasing my own magic to everyone. If you're not convinced that I'm capable of beating Guiche afterward, you can challenge me to a duel at any time. But only after that. Sound good?"

Louise actually went pale. "Are you seriously going to challenge him to a duel!? That's Captain Lamarc of the Griffon Knight Corps! He's a lot tougher than Guiche was, and that duel nearly cost you your life!"

"I also was kinda fumbling around at the time. Now that I've had time to refine my art, there should be less of a threat to my own safety...well, less so than usual, anyway."

"Absolutely NOT!" Louise countermanded. "Captain Gramont, please forgive my Familiar's loose tongue! He's not had time to adjust to his settings, and-"

"If you will not teach him, Valliere, then consider yourself lucky to have someone who will. I will accept your terms, Familiar. Just don't expect me to give you any mercy for the trouble you've caused my family." With that, Lamarc left, with both Louise and Guiche staring at him in abject shock.

"You must be out of your mind," said Guiche. "Lamarc has always been the more powerful mage between the two of us! And yet you're going to challenge him to a duel without a second thought?"

"Blame the sword, he got me into it," Lloyd shrugged.

" _Come on, partner! If you're gonna be a Planeswalker, you may as well act like you've got the magic! I mean, between you and Pinkie here, someone's got to be the magic user, and it's pretty much you!"_

"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME!?" Louise snapped, trying to yank Derf out of his sheath, pulling Lloyd down with her.

Meanwhile, the Exhibition Festival was going on like nothing was really happening backstage. Kirche had flame performing some very impressive pyrotechnics. Montmorency played violin while her frog danced along. Malicorne, a heavy-built second year, sent out his owl with a long stream of flags attached to its talons. Guiche merely posed with Verdandi on a bed of roses, but that was definitely enough to score points with the females in the crowd. But Tabitha and Slyphid were the clear frontrunners with their impressive display of aerobatics, performing tricks at least a good fifty feet over everyone's heads.

"Wow. That's gonna be some stiff competition," Lloyd observed.

"Change in plans. You're going to go outside, take one bow, and then get off stage as fast as you can."

"What!? Like hell!" Lloyd shouted, rounding on his master. "I spent a whole week on this! No way in hell am I throwing out now! And lest we forget, Lamarc is gonna be watching me like a hawk! If I go out there and then turn tail and run, that's all he needs to start swinging!"

"It doesn't matter! The princess saw what you're like, and at least this way we can settle your dispute with Captain Gramont in private, like all duels are meant to be!"

" _Next up: Louise Francoise Leblanc de Valliere and her Familiar, Lloyd Kreis!_ "

"No turning back now, I guess." Lloyd took a deep breath, and then reached into his coat to produce the flute he'd been using all week. "Louise, say _merdre._ "

"What's the point of saying may-rde? Louise asked, but got no reply as Lloyd made his way outside.

Lloyd silently took the stage, bowing once before the audience. Then, he produced three cards from his deck: two Plains and a Mountain. The three lands fell, one at a time, shattering on impact, and the haze of white and gathered around his wrist. Sonya suddenly stood up in shock, apparently recognizing what was happening, but Henrietta suddenly pulled at her hip plate, shaking her head. That pretty much confirmed Lloyd's suspicions about her, but at the moment she didn't appear to pose a threat. Instead, he produced a second Mountain, followed by a card. " **Myr Propagator!** "

The mana around him swirled, transforming into the metallic creation. It saluted, ready for action. "Go fetch, buddy."

The Propagator left the stage in search of whatever it was, and it came back with, of all things, a mandolin. Then, Lloyd produced a second card. " **Lodestone Myr!** "

The massive Myr behemoth rose up, earning a loud "ooh" from the crowd. It lumbered into position near the back, and Lloyd pointed at the Propagator. "Duplicate!" The mana from his wrists transformed into a sheet of metal, which the Propagator promptly started taking apart, forming it into a clone of itself. It too saluted before Lloyd before taking up position on top of the Lodestone Myr's head.

"Okay boys. From the top!" Lloyd placed his composition sheet on the podium, raising his flute. "One, two..."

 **(Play: Braum - League of Legends)**

The Propagator on the mandolin began to pluck out a jaunty tune as the Lodestone Myr began to smack parts of its body in a slow, steady rhythm, then gave a baritone hum, setting the bass line. Then, the Propagator on top of the Lodestone Myr began to hum in a tenor as well, setting the melody. Lloyd flipped the page, sticking to his strategy, unaware of the people mumbling things behind them.

"What music is this?"

"Maybe it's folk music from where he's from?"

"It's certainly...different..."

Louise was about ready to tear her hair out. She _knew_ it was a bad idea to let him do this kind of thing on his own! She'd given her Familiar too much free reign yet again, and now it was coming back to haunt her in a bad way.

The first movement ended, and the second Myr Propagator promptly jumped off the Lodestone Myr's head in a nice little front flip. Lloyd took over in the second movement, playing his flute as he pointed at the Propagator once again, summoning another sheet of metal to assemble yet another one with. Now with four Myrs, they went back into first movement, leading everyone along with the third Propagator in the alto range. Lloyd stomped his foot, mixing up the percussion of the Lodestone Myr as he dropped a third Plains he'd kept in between the pages.

Lloyd chanced a look behind him as they went into the third movement, as the Myr on the mandolin took over the brief solo. There were starting to get into it. That was good. He just needed a bit more. He dropped a third Mountain, pointed at the two lone Myr Propagators, summoning two sheets of metal. Now he had the full complement, and promptly spun around to face the crowd with his Myrs as they marched into line alongside him. Artifacts may have been his magic style, but music had always been Lloyd's element, and he would use his skills to the fullest here, leading the charge back into the first movement for the finale.

It had the desired effect. The crowd had begun to rise, clapping along to the beat. Up with Princess Henrietta, she wasn't with the rest of the crowd, but she was clearly enjoying herself. Even her retainer was mildly enjoying herself, though clearly whatever suspicions she had about him (and vice versa) were still in play. Hopefully she wouldn't try to accost him until after he'd gone off the stage. Finally, Lloyd and his troupe slowed the beat in a _ritardando_ , finishing on one triumphant blast.

Nothing really happened for a moment. Even though everybody had risen out of their seats, they seemed to have stood up almost subconsciously, and now they seemed to wonder what was going on. Then, a small applause broke through the silence that had fallen. Coming right from Henrietta.

The royal favor settled everything, and everyone promptly began to applaud and cheer. Lloyd grinned, enjoying the feel of a standing ovation as he bowed, and with a wave of his hand, dismissed his Myrs and went off stage.

Or at least, attempted to.

"Hold it!" A loud groan went up from the crowd as Lamarc stormed on the stage right as Lloyd was leaving. "Am I supposed to seriously believe that you could defeat my brother when all you've proven is you can play a little music? You are in desperate need of a reminder of who your betters are, Familiar. And where your place is among them."

Lloyd sighed. He chanced a look at Louise, who was calling him back with an absolutely mortified look on her face. Guiche was also waving him off. But then he looked at Henrietta, who was looking on with curiosity probably not befitting of a royal, and Sonya, who had actually risen from her chair again with her hand on something at her waist. Nonetheless, he quickly rearranged his Myrs into a line in front of him, ready to receive Lamarc's attack. "Fine. But just so we're clear, I gave you an out beforehand."

Guiche facepalmed with his non-rose hand. "Your Familiar is an idiot, Valliere."

"Not now, Guiche!" screamed Louise.

Lamarc drew his sword, prompting Lloyd to draw Derf. The sword was a long curved cavalry saber, but there was something about the sword's design that was setting off Lloyd's sixth sense. Then, he stabbed the ground with it, summoning a large metallic warrior made of silver, reminiscent of a French musketeer, complete with feathered hat and rapier.

"That's it?" asked Lloyd. "Propagator, take him!" One of the Propagators charged, striking the warrior clean in the chest. The musketeer didn't even flinch. It merely took its rapier and thrust the Propagator in the chest, destroying it easily. "Oh...oh, crap..."

"I am Captain Lamarc de Gramont of the Tristain Griffon Knight Corps. My runic name is Lamarc the Argentate. Whatever you expected out of my brother, do not expect out of me!" Lamarc said, stabbing the ground again. Another musketeer erupted from the ground, and the two of them lunged at Lloyd with their swords.

"Block!" Two more Myr Propagators split off from Lloyd, intercepting the attacks at their own existence. "Get in there, big guy!" The Lodestone Myr also lumbered forward, swinging its massive brass fist at Lamarc. Lamarc spun around the massive construct's fist, swinging his sword. The Myr fell apart in two halves. "Oh, come on!"

"You disappoint me." The musketeers lunged again. Lloyd parried the first awkwardly, but the second kicked him in the stomach, sending him tumbling off the stage. "Is this all you can conjure, Familiar?"

Lloyd summoned two cards from his deck. "Actually, no!" He dropped one Mountain, and then raised the other. " **Geosurge!** " The card shot into the ground and summoned a large geyser of red mana, coalescing around his hands once again. Lamarc raised an eyebrow, but said nothing, waiting for the next move. " **Myr Turbine!** " That next move was to summon the massive energy tower Lloyd had used against Siesta.

"This is getting out of hand. Princess, you have to let me get in there and this fight before someone gets hurt," Sonya said.

Henrietta nodded. She'd rather settle this privately than let the spectacle continue where someone innocent could get hurt. "Very well, Sonya. But please be careful."

"Always am," Sonya said, opening the deck case at her belt as seven cards lifted out on their own, circling around her right hand. She promptly made her way right to the edge of the stage, right as Lloyd was going for his next card, two cards dropping to her feet as a haze of white and blue began to circle around her body. " **Lyev Decree!** "

A great burst of sunlight shone down from the heavens on top of Lloyd and Lamarc, binding together their limbs with a set of rune-inscribed triangles.

"I knew it..." Lloyd growled, looking over at Sonya. "You're a Planeswalker like me, aren't you?"

"Well, I don't know so much about Planeswalker, but yeah, I've got the same tricks as you, if that's what you're talking about," Sonya replied. "But as long as I've got you two to stop fighting, I'll have you know I've just about had it up to here with your bullshit today. Captain, stop trying to kill him. And you, Mister Familiar, stop daring him to try."

"Sir Sonya, I have no quarrel with you. But I must avenge the stain upon my family this Familiar has caused us," Lamarc countered.

"He's not going to stop just because you Detained the both of us, you know. Once the effect ends, he's just gonna pick up where he left off," Lloyd added.

"You're welcome to try," Sonya countered. "I got a lot more control spells than you think I do. But, if you're still bent on trying to destroy each other, then that's fine. But I suggest you move this somewhere else and start from scratch. Okay?"

The enchantment ended. Both mages sheathed their swords while Lloyd dismissed the Myr Turbine and his remaining artifacts while the two musketeers Lamarc had summoned disappeared into the aether. "Good call, boys. Now, let's get moving."

* * *

Louise was furious with how everything had panned out. What else is new?

"I told you, just take a bow, and then get out of there!" Louise shouted as she, Guiche, Lloyd, Lamarc, and Sonya made their way to another part of the courtyard.

"What are you talking about!? They loved the performance piece!" Lloyd countered. "Besides, if you want to blame anybody for what happened afterward, then blame Gilgamesh and Jessica Jones over here-"

"My name's Sonya, smartass," Sonya said flatly.

"You had the option not to duel him, but instead you chose to make a private matter into a spectacle for the princess and everyone in the school to see! You'd better expect to be harshly punished fo-o-o-or...!" Louise and the rest suddenly stopped, looking up at something in front of them. Lloyd turned to face the front and saw a golem.

A golem that was made of dirt and was a good three stories high to boot. This golem was less refined than either of the golems used by the Gramont brothers, as it was basically just a walking mountain with trees sticking out of its back and shoulders. And standing atop the golem's head was a hooded woman in black, with green hair sticking out over the cowl.

"Okay, I'm guessing that's a golem..." Lloyd said, turning to Lamarc and Guiche. "Did either of you summon a golem ahead of us for some weird reason?"

"As if I would summon such an ugly thing," scoffed Lamarc.

"That golem is enormous! Such a thing is well beyond my current skill level!" Guiche added.

"Huh. That's probably the first honest thing you've said since you got to this school."

"Not now!" Lloyd and Sonya snapped at the two brothers.

"Your luck's just run out!" Suddenly the golem moved, reaching down with its massive hand at its master's command.

"Scatter!" Sonya, Guiche, and Lamarc quickly bolted out of the way. Lloyd shoved Louise out of the way, but wasn't fast enough to get away himself and was promptly slammed to the ground before being hoisted up into the air.

"Lloyd!" screamed Louise.

"Louise, take cover! This is about to get rough!" Lloyd said. Unfortunately, there wasn't a lot he could do, because the golem was holding him by his lower half, cutting him off from his deck. And to make matters worse...

"You let go of Lloyd right now!" Louise had drawn her wand for the fight.

"Seriously, Louise! I can't fight like this and the last thing I need is you throwing explosions everywhere!" Louise ignored Lloyd, chanting in that weird French-like language again. "Am I being ignored right now!?"

" _Well, maybe an explosion will get us out of this mess,_ " offered Derf. " _A good blast in the right place will destabilize the golem enough to a point where we could escape!_ "

" **FIREBALL!** " Louise finished her incantation. Nothing happened for a moment, and then, right on cue, an explosion rang off the golem's arm just inches to the left of where Lloyd was behind held.

"Did...did you seriously miss a spell at point-blank range?" asked Sonya.

"So this is the legendary third child of the Valliere family," Lamarc observed. "Her reputation for failing even basic magic is apparently quite true."

"You shut up!" Louise shouted at them. "It was just a little mistake, that's all!"

"JUST A LITTLE MISTAKE!? AN INCH TO THE RIGHT AND YOU WOULD'VE TAKEN MY HEAD CLEAN OFF!"

However, Lloyd's captor seemed to have a different opinion of what had just happened, instead looking over at the wall next to them. The explosion may have been directed at her golem, but the resultant force had caused the tower wall to actually crack apart from the impact. "Well, in any case, this is a lucky break. Go, golem!"

The golem promptly took its other hand and swung its fist at the wall, creating a huge cloud of dust as the wall shattered under the impact. The hooded woman quickly dove into the hole she just created, and then promptly came back out with a purple ornate case of some kind. "I should thank you for this. Here you go!"

The golem withdrew its arm and then threw Lloyd screaming back to the ground. But then, a dark blue blur got in the way, stopping him from becoming a courtyard pizza: Tabitha, astride Sylphid and sporting a small golden crown on her head.

"That was too close..." sighed Lloyd. "Thanks for the save, Tabitha!"

"You're welcome," Tabitha said, quickly turning downwind to return Lloyd to Louise.

The hooded woman and her golem decided to take the opportunity to make their escape, but someone got in her way. " **Inaction Injunction!** " Another set of runic triangles, blue this time, came down on her and the golem, stopping her from making her getaway as Sonya got in front of her. "Where do you think you're going?"

"Ugh! You pest!" The woman promptly gestured, and the golem's chest suddenly shot out a series of stalactites at her.

" **Cancel!** " Sonya threw out another card, given to her from Inaction Injunction. The stalactites broke apart midflight and clattered harmlessly to the ground at her feet.

"She stopped her spell?" Louise asked herself in surprise.

"That's because Cancel is a counterspell. It's meant to shut down the enemy's spells before they're casted," Lloyd explained. "Remember our lecture on the colors of magic?"

"Lloyd! Louise!" Both mages turned to see Henrietta of all people, accompanied by her four remaining knights, running towards them.

"Your Highness, you must leave! It's too dangerous for you to be here!" Lamarc said.

The hooded woman looked down at that moment and saw an opportunity. "Golem!" The golem raised its foot and stomped down, kicking up another massive cloud of dust. As everyone shielded their faces from the attack, the golem scooped Henrietta up in its massive fist.

"Your Highness!" shouted Lamarc.

"Henrietta!" cried Louise.

"Don't worry, boys! I'm not looking to kill her, I'm just trying to make off with what I came for! But if any of you try to stop me before I get clear of the Academy, I'll have the golem crush her in its grip," said the woman.

"You fiend! You can't win in a fair fight so you resort to taking hostages!" Guiche snapped.

"And what makes you think you could've fought me in a fair fight in the first place!" the woman retorted, earning a cringe from Guiche. "Now who's willing to guarantee my safety for hers?"

"You scheming-!" Lamarc began.

"Careful now…" the woman said, wagging her finger. There was a slight rumbling, and Henrietta winced as the golem's grip tightened. Lamarc fell silent, unsure of what to do.

Lloyd, however, had managed to get away unseen in the chaos. Coughing, covered in dust, and his lower extremities sore in a way he didn't want to think about until he got to bed that night, he quickly scurried around the back while Lamarc and the woman hashed out their negotiations, with Henrietta squirming in the golem's tightening grip. He needed to do something, anything. But what?

"Hey." Lloyd looked over and saw Sonya coming to him.

"Hell of a situation we got ourselves in, huh?" Lloyd asked.

"You're funny, but I wish you weren't right now," Sonya countered. "Listen. I have a plan to get the princess away from her, but I need a massive monster I can drop on her head to distract her. Thing is, my deck's not designed for that kind of head-on assault. You got anything in that deck of yours that'll do the trick?"

Lloyd summoned two cards from his deck and showed them to her. "I run Myrs. This is as big as I've got, plus a little bit of power afterward."

Sonya leaned in, then grinned and nodded. "That'll do nicely. **Aerial Maneuver!** " A white glow suddenly came over Lloyd. It was a feeling of power he wasn't quite expecting, not exactly strength but he definitely felt like he was more maneuverable than usual. "Get as much air time as you can, then drop that big thing on that bitch's head."

Lloyd blinked. "Wait…seriously? You're being a lot more trusting than I figured you'd be, concerning how you were with me and Lamarc earlier."

"Henrietta seems to trust you, all things considered. The least I can do is see why she does. Now hurry up, that's a spell that only lasts until the end of a turn."

Lloyd nodded, taking a few steps backward. Then, he took a running start and jumped. The spell launched him into the air a good fifty feet, well over the unsuspecting head of the woman and her golem. For a moment, all he could focus on was the view of the Academy and the surrounding countryside, and how pretty it was. It almost reminded him of home. Home, somewhere away from the crazy and the arrogance that seemed to hang around here.

Then, he began to fall, and he jumped back to the task at hand. Mana around his wrists flared as he took one card in his hand and thrust it downward. " **Myr Battlesphere!** "

The card glowed, then began to increase in size, forming into a ball about the size of a basketball and growing exponentially with each second. By the time the hooded woman had seen the massive shadow forming over her, four Myrs suddenly dropped down, surrounding her. "Wait…what?" She looked up, and there was a massive ball of Myrs, easily the size of a large boulder on the top of a mountain, coming down on her head. The golem raised both of its arms to catch the massive boulder.

And in so doing, actually threw Henrietta into the air.

"Shit!" Lloyd quickly summoned a third card and threw it out. " **Hovermyr!** " The flying Myr shot out, grabbing Lloyd in its arms as they dove headlong for the falling princess. "Princess! Arms out!"

Henrietta saw Lloyd diving out of the sky and quickly stretched out her arms, even as the shockwave from the Battlesphere's impact threatened to throw her off-course. But, Lloyd got to her first, hands gripping hands as he pulled her in close and got clear of the area.

"Your Highness!" Lamarc was instantly there to receive her. "Are you alright?"

"Yes, I'm fine," Henrietta nodded.

"Incoming!" one of the knights shouted. The golem, despite having stumbled back a few steps, had managed to reestablish its footing and hoisted the Myr Battlesphere over its head, ready to throw it right back at them.

"I got this. Everyone take cover!" Lloyd took the second card he'd summoned and threw it at the Battlesphere. " **Artillerize!** "

The Battlesphere began to glow white-hot, whistling and hissing from immense heat and pressure before it detonated in an explosion of fire and molten metal, consuming the golem in its flames as everyone took cover behind a nearby pillar for protection. After taking a moment to make sure the danger had passed, everyone peeked out.

There was nothing left of the golem, just a pair of mounds of dirt where its feet had been. It was surrounded by a ring of soot and ash some ten feet wide, and a section of the nearby tower where this all had been taking place was also covered in soot. But even though the threat had been neutralized, there was no sign of their mysterious enemy.

"Did…did you kill her?" asked Guiche.

"I'm pretty sure I didn't," Lloyd frowned.

"How do you know?" asked Lamarc.

"Artillerize only deals 5 damage. It's definitely powerful as far as burn spells go, but unless she'd been injured in a previous fight, I'm pretty sure she's still alive, somewhere," Lloyd explained. "But it killed the Golem, so that's always a plus. But, you never know with these things."

"So she's still out there," finished Louise.

"And she's gonna be pissed," nodded Lloyd.


	5. Enforcer and the Staff of Destruction

**Hey everyone! HQ here again!**

 **So, I managed to finish up my education, so I am now plus one B.A. in English, and took the next couple of months off to relax, go to AX and see JAM Project perform as part of the One Punch Man debut (not to mention get a selfie with Hai. Yeah, _that_ Hai), and now that it's August, I'm gearing up for the next step in my life. And that includes this fic!**

 **Those of you who sent reviews last chapter, hang on, I'll be replying to you in a minute.**

 **So, on with the show!**

* * *

 **Turn 05: The Enforcer and the Staff of Destruction**

Things were hardly quiet after the incident. Now that most of the students had actually seen or heard of Sonya and her abilities due to the craziness, rumors abounded of how Louise or her family had paid off some other noble family from another country to have Lloyd masquerade as her Familiar, as well as the fact that nobody had the magic to take down a golem of that size in one go. Worse still (for Guiche, anyway) were rumors that the aborted fight with Lamarc was an attempt to get the Gramont family's influence involved to further cement Lloyd's legitimacy, so now he was having to dodge questions in Lamarc's place in addition to Lamarc breathing down his neck to "fix this or get fixed himself."

Still, this didn't stop Kirche from trying to woo over Lloyd for his previous bravery by feeding him fresh fruit from Germania during study hall the next day. The rumors had only served to fuel her passions for the mysterious Planeswalker-hopeful, and even now was doing this directly in front of Louise for added flair. "Do you like it, Lloyd?"

"This is actually pretty good. Never had grapefruit before. I'm normally a grapes or a banana guy myself…"

"I'm glad you like it. It's a specialty from Germania…"

Louise couldn't take it anymore. She promptly pulled Lloyd away from Kirche by the lapels of one of his other new coats, this one white and green with hints of black in the sleeves and hem, and marked with the symbol of the Abzan from the Tarkir block, and then shoved him face-first into the desk. "Hey! Don't start feeding someone else's Familiar!"

"Then why are you attacking me!? Get off, I'm still sore from yesterday!"

"Oh, it's alright. It's not like we have anything to do during study hall. The faculty are so concerned about that thief that they can't even bother to hold classes," Kirche said idly.

"Is that – ow! – why nobody's showed up in the last twenty minutes? I heard if no teacher showed up by then class was considered cancelled and you could just leave – Louise, for the love of God, _get off me!_ "

"Besides, I heard that they were going to blame Princess Henrietta for the theft," Kirche added. Hearing this, both Louise and Lloyd stopped fighting each other, looking at the Germanian redhead in confusion. "The reason being that the guards that were usually stationed to defend the vault were pulled from that station to guard the princess. Plus, she came to the Academy despite all of her advisors telling her not to."

"…why in the bluish flaming hell would they do that?" asked Lloyd. "The thief actually had the Princess as a hostage at some point, why on earth would they want to blame her for something she literally had no control over?" Kirche shrugged, and Lloyd slumped against his desk. "I really hate politics…"

The door opened, and Professor Colbert came into the room. "Miss Valliere and Miss Tabitha, please come with me to the Headmaster's office at once!"

"Oh fantastic," groaned Lloyd. "It just got worse."

 **(Play OP: Resolution by ROMANTIC MODE – After Wars Gundam X OP 2)**

* * *

Lloyd, Louise and Tabitha made their way into the Headmaster's office, which was just a simple circular room with a large desk, two couches and a coffee table for sitting, and a large wardrobe off to the side. There was also a mirror in the corner, which Lloyd found strange, but there was a lot more going on here than he probably knew about, so he let it be as he took up standing behind Louise. The whole faculty was also present in the room, as well as Old Man Osmond himself. Also there were Henrietta and Sonya, for some strange reason.

"So, what's the occasion?" asked Lloyd. "And why are they still here? I would think that the Princess would've been whisked away under cover of night after all that," he added, jerking his head towards Henrietta and Sonya.

Louise stomped on his foot. "At least be polite when you ask!"

"Well, that was the idea, anyway," Sonya shrugged. "But the Princess insisted that she stay until the Staff of Destruction was returned, given she is partly responsible for the whole thing."

"Oh come on!" Lloyd threw up his hands. "You honestly don't believe that, do you, Princess?"

"I appreciate your concern, ser Lloyd," Henrietta said, her voice sure in spite of what she was saying. "But whether I'm actually guilty of anything shouldn't be the issue. I would prefer to look for the Staff of Destruction instead."

" _Wow. Smart and polite. This girl's right up your alley, partner!_ " Derf cracked in Lloyd's ear.

Lloyd pinched Derf's mouth shut with his fingers. "Hush, you!"

"Now, as I'm sure you are all aware of yesterday's events, so I won't go over them," Osmond said, calling everyone to order. "I've sent Miss Longueville to try and pick up on our mysterious thief's trail, and she's told me she's found a lead."

"Upon questioning several people in town, we got word that a mysterious shadow was seen entering and leaving a deserted shack in a forest outside of town," Longueville said. "I also gathered testimony from those witnesses and constructed a rough sketch based on it."

She handed Osmond a rolled scroll. Osmond unrolled it, then flipped it over to reveal a charcoal sketch of the hooded woman they had fought earlier.

"That's Fouquet! There's no doubt about it!" Louise declared. Tabitha also nodded, which started some murmurs among the faculty.

"I'm sorry, who's Fouquet?" asked Lloyd.

"Fouquet of the Crumbling Dirt is a magical cat thief, basically," explained Sonya. "She's been prowling around the kingdom in search of magical artifacts. Nobles have been reporting break-ins at their mansions and magical artifacts that they own suddenly gone missing. Though usually, the things that have been stolen were trinkets or minor artifacts, nothing world-shattering. Nonetheless, she's still a Triangle-Class mage at the very least, and that's what makes her dangerous."

"Unfortunately, Sir Franklin, that's where things have changed," Osmond said. "This time, Fouquet has stolen the Staff of Destruction, a powerful magical weapon we have kept here in the Academy's vault. We must recover it, not only to restore our honor, but to keep her from discovering the secrets of the Staff or selling it off to someone who could."

"We could always send in the Royal Guard," said Colbert. "With the Princess and Sir Franklin here, getting approval should not be an issue."

"By the time the Royal Guard will get there, Fouquet will have discovered our plan. If we're going to get the Staff of Destruction, it has to be by our own hands. Raise your staff if you are willing to accept the challenge!"

Nobody said anything. It was hard not for Lloyd to see why: this was the same Fouquet that had summoned a three-story golem that had required the most devastating combo in Lloyd's arsenal to destroy, and even then Fouquet still managed to get away apparently unscathed. Osmond, still trying to get a sense of assent, prodded further. "What's wrong? Will no one raise their fame by capturing Fouquet?"

Still nothing.

Then, Louise raised her wand. "I'll go!"

"Say wot?" asked Lloyd.

"Miss Valliere…" Colbert began.

The door suddenly fell open.

"Wait! I'll go as well!"

"Kirche?" asked Lloyd in surprise.

"Zerbst?" asked Louise in annoyance.

"Well, I for one, can't afford to be shown up by a Valliere," said Kirche, her own wand raised as well.

"So much so that you'd risk getting in trouble for eavesdropping?" asked Lloyd. However, both girls ignored him and suddenly looked at Tabitha. She had raised her staff as well.

"Tabitha, you too?" asked Kirche.

"…worried about you…" was all Tabitha said.

Henrietta looked over at Sonya, who raised her deck. "Sonya, you're going, too?"

"I've got a bone to pick with Fouquet. And you'll be safer here than you will be with me," Sonya said. "I also have a feeling Lamarc's gonna want to tag along as well."

Lloyd sighed. "I guess if Louise is going, so am I."

Osmond sighed, relieved that three of his students, at the very least, had decided to throw him a lifeline. "If that's the case, I will leave it in your hands. After all, Miss Tabitha here has already earned the title of Chevalier, despite being so young."

That got more than a few looks from the others.

"Tabitha's a knight!?" asked Louise.

Tabitha merely nodded.

"You're kidding me! Was she knighted when she was two, or something?" asked Lloyd. Louise promptly stomped on his foot again.

"We also have Miss von Zerbst, who is from an established military family in Germania," added Osmond. "Add that to her high level of mastery of Fire magic, then she's an obvious choice." And then, he looked over at Louise, clearly expecting the same level of praise. "And then we have Louise, the third daughter of the Valliere family, which has produced several great mages…and…well, she tries very hard, at the very least…ah! Her Familiar is a mighty swordsman who has already saved the school on one occasion!"

Louise sagged. Lloyd rubbed her shoulders, trying to not let her bruised ego get the better of her. "Well, it could be worse."

"That's right! He's the legendary Gand-" Colbert began, but suddenly he got a searing look from Osmond, and trailed off.

Longueville gave him a look, but didn't appear to think much more of it, instead stepping forward. "Old Osmond, I will serve as their guide, with your permission," she said.

"Oh? Would you?" asked Osmond.

"That was my intention from the beginning."

"Excellent!" said Lloyd, clapping his hand once. "So! When do we begin?"

* * *

Later that day, Longueville had arrived outside the gate with a horse and cart to transport them. Lloyd, Louise, Tabitha, Kirche, and Sonya were already waiting outside, although Kirche was spending the time trying to put the moves on Lloyd again, much to Louise's dismay. However, Lamarc didn't arrive until much later, dragging someone with him.

"Guiche?" asked Lloyd.

"Yes, yes, hello," Guiche said, giving a quick wave to the group before finally pulling his arm away from his older brother. "Now what on earth is all of this?"

"You're coming with us to retrieve the Staff of Destruction, little brother," Lamarc said flatly.

A loud shout of confusion went up from the crowd, Louise being the loudest. "What!? Why?!"

"So in addition to Miss Longueville," said Lloyd, counting off on his fingers. "We have myself, Louise, Tabitha, Kirche, Sonya, you, and now Guiche. Do we really need eight people to go hunting for one person who stole one thing?"

"I would agree in most other situations, but I'd prefer he still come along anyway," said Lamarc. "Who knows? He may just prove more useful than just trying to woo every member of the female persuasion he comes across."

"Lamarc, this is not the time or the place to be settling your family business," said Sonya. "Besides, shouldn't your bigger issue be with Lloyd? He _is_ the one who beat Guiche in a duel, after all."

"Oy! Don't throw me under the bus!" Lloyd snapped at the Azorius user.

"Just stating the facts," Sonya shrugged.

"I still refuse to believe that this Familiar was capable of defeating Guiche, regardless of his skills," Lamarc said flatly. "But, if he, or Guiche, for that matter, conduct themselves in a way that shows they have a certain degree of respect for magic that a noble would have, I may be willing to reconsider my position."

"So no pressure," Lloyd snarked, getting in the cart.

"Be nice, Lloyd!" Louise snapped at her Familiar, getting in the cart as well. Tabitha, Kirche, and Sonya joined them while Miss Longueville went to the front. The teacher took the reins and cracked them once. The horse promptly began a slow trot down the road toward their eventual destination.

* * *

Lloyd had to admit, travelling this way was a lot nicer than riding on horseback with Louise, especially since this time she wasn't taking time to actively correct him on his posture or accidentally groping her (which he was still unsure on how that was, considering his hands weren't anywhere near her breasts). Instead, he could lean back and look at the rolling green hills and the farmland that seemed to stretch on forever, or look up at the sunlight through the trees.

"If you don't mind me asking, Familiar…" Lamarc suddenly spoke up. "How are you certain that Fouquet may have survived the blast from your spell?"

"Huh?" Lloyd shifted himself back into a sitting position.

"You said something about damage earlier," Lamarc said. "Sir Sonya gave an explanation about how both of you perform magic, but I'm still puzzled about that word in particular."

Lloyd looked over at the red-haired bodyguard, who merely shrugged. "I told him about the color wheel, at least. He never asked about damage or anything like that until now."

Hearing Sonya say the words "color wheel" suddenly had Lloyd's mind racing, knowing that he'd only told two other people about the color wheel, and as far as he knew, one hadn't seen Sonya since the break-in, and the other was probably too busy to say anything to her even if she asked. This all but confirmed Lloyd's initial suspicions about her, but Kirche suddenly jumped in on the conversation. "Please, go on, Darling! I'd love to hear more about your magic!"

"Zerbst…!" Louise was already muscling in on the redhead.

"Everyone settle down!" Lloyd finally relented. "Now, as Sonya here may have mentioned to you, the cards that she and I use are based on a game. We explained the lore of the magic behind the cards, but so far, I've only mentioned to Louise what the object of the game is. And in Magic: the Gathering, there are typically three ways to win. The first, and most common of these, is to reduce your opponent's life from 20 to 0."

"Their…life?" asked Guiche.

"It's the most direct way possible," said Sonya. "By constantly attacking and casting spells, eventually the opponent runs out of defenses and will take damage."

"Unfortunately, whether this means they are simply knocked out or actually dead, I'm not sure. And I'm trying to avoid reaching that end for the moment," Lloyd continued. "The second way is to force your opponent to draw a card from their deck when they have no cards in it. This way is less common, as the strategy of milling is typically reserved for blue decks or some black ones, but it's just as effective, as you're robbing your opponent of his best spells before he can even get them into his hand. But this technique typically involves attacking your opponent's mind, lore-wise, so I'm not big on checking to see if that'll kill someone, either."

"And the third?" Lamarc asked.

"The third, and the rarest by far, is by winning through some kind of special card effect. The one card I know off the top of my head that has an instant-win condition is Maze's End, from the Return to Ravnica Block. If you played that card and you had ten different Gate cards also in play when you did, you automatically won. But those cards are exceedingly rare and trying to create a winning deck out of it is almost impossible."

"So when you said that the Artillerize spell wouldn't kill her, you were saying that was impossible because it wouldn't have brought her life to 0?" asked Louise.

"That's the idea. Unless she was injured in a previous battle, in which case, maybe, but seeing as Fouquet was spotted around here, safe to say, she was _not_ blown to smithereens," Lloyd shrugged. "Even if we could factor in my Myr Battlesphere's power, it still wouldn't bring her below half. But, that actually leads me to something else I wanted to tackle…" Lloyd turned to Sonya. "You said 'color wheel' earlier. There's only three people I know that actually use that term to describe the colors in Magic. I'm one of them, the other is Louise, and the third is a friend of mine I'm pretty convinced you haven't met yourself."

"What are you saying?" Sonya asked.

"I'm saying I've got a sneaking suspicion you're from the same place that I am," Lloyd said.

"Wait, are you saying she's from your world?" Louise asked.

Sonya didn't say anything, instead choosing to stare long and hard at Lloyd, trying to find some kind of hole in his logic, or perhaps debating to herself whether she should answer it at all. Eventually, she settled for the vague "are you sure? You could be barking up the wrong tree, buddy."

"Well, you use a term only a veteran Magic player would use, you jumped in my explanation on how to win at the game easily enough, and finally, your deck. Your deck is a white-blue control deck, built around blocking the opponent's moves while you attack unopposed," Lloyd explained. "I've had three other people use decks, but you were the first to actively tell me your deck wasn't equipped for outright destruction. That means you know how your deck works on a level beyond 'point and burn.'"

Sonya sighed and folded her arms. "Damn, you're pretty good. And you figured it out in the space of a couple of days?"

"I had my suspicions about you," Lloyd explained. "But after a while the evidence came through."

"So she is from your world," said Kirche, looking over at Sonya. Lloyd figured she was trying to size her up for comparison, and after observing Sonya's shorter red hair and boyish figure, she settled back into her seat, apparently confident she was more beautiful than the women from wherever they were from.

Sonya laid back in her seat for a moment, then leaned forward. "Well then. I may as well introduce myself properly. My name is Sonya Franklin, Top 16 finisher at Grand Prix Seattle, Enforcer of the Crown, and bodyguard to Princess Henrietta."

"Bodyguard?" asked Guiche.

"Top 16?" asked Lloyd.

Sonya gave Guiche and Lloyd a look. "Oh, what? You'd never thought a woman could make it on the battlefield?"

Lamarc actually chuckled as Guiche stammered for a moment, unable to come up with a reply. Lloyd managed to bail him out by replying, "Hardly. I was just surprised to meet such an accomplished player. All the friends I had who ever went to any Grand Prix never made it past day one, never mind top 16."

"Why? Is Top 16 in a tournament such a worthy goal for people like you?" Louise asked with a bit more venom than Lloyd was expecting.

"We're here." Longueville stopped the cart. A short distance into the forest was a small wooden hut. The wood was old and gray, and sections of the window had broken from exposure to the elements. Just looking at the place gave Lloyd splinters through his shoes.

"You'll find Top 16 in a group of ten-thousand and some-odd people is quite the goal," Lloyd said to Louise quietly. He turned to Longueville. "You sure?"

"According to the information, it has to be that shack," said Longueville.

"It's just an old shack for burning charcoal," said Kirche.

"It could be camouflage," Louise said.

Lloyd summoned two cards from his deck. One of them was a Plains, the other his **Signal Pest**. "Empty house or no, we can't take the risk that there's no traps around here."

Tabitha muttered something and waved her staff in an arc over her head. A trail of sparkles followed, but not much else. "…no traps."

"Thanks, Tabitha. Now just to clear the shack itself…" Lloyd frowned, turning his Plains into mana as he approached the window. Louise watched with curiosity as he lowered his body and stood on the balls of his feet, stalking close to the broken window as he held out his second card. " **Signal Pest!** " the miniature creature appeared in his hand, and he led it into one of the holes in the window. It jumped down into the shack. "If it's clear, squawk once, twice if it's not."

The Signal Pest wandered off into the darkness of the hut, barely visible in the single room's darkness. Eventually, it jumped onto the nearby table, and gave a loud noise like a raven's caw. Lloyd sighed. "It's clear!"

Louise and Kirche sighed with relief. Lloyd's Signal Pest came back and jumped into his hand, and he made his way to the door. With a free hand, he pushed against the handle, and it swung open easily enough. Lloyd looked down at his Signal Pest, a question already on his lips, but the artifact creature shook its tiny head. Something was wrong. He jerked his head towards the group, and went inside.

"Darling-!" Kirche promptly went after him, followed by Tabitha.

Louise, however, remained behind. "I'll stand guard outside!"

"Would you?" Lloyd asked from inside the hut.

Lamarc gave Guiche a hard shove. "Go with them. Sir Sonya and I will remain here with Miss Valliere. At least this way someone can guard our back."

Guiche gave Lamarc a glare, but Lamarc merely glared right back. Guiche quickly ran off after Tabitha and Kirche, muttering something dark, and probably not nice, under his breath.

"I'll take the opportunity to scout the local area as well," said Longueville, heading off into the trees. "There is a chance we could be ambushed here."

* * *

Inside the hut, Kirche, Lloyd, and Tabitha fanned out in search of clues. But the house was so small it probably didn't even need them all. The bed was right next to the door, and there was so much dust it clearly had either not seen a lot of use in recent days, or perhaps it had been abandoned. A few bottles lay next to the hearth, and a dusty pitcher and plate stood on top of the nearby dresser.

"Oh, at this rate, I'll be covered in dust…!" moaned Kirche as Lloyd disturbed the dust on a nearby table.

"Be thankful it's only this small," Lloyd said around a sneeze or two. "If it's here, it's bound to be just sitting around…"

Right as he said this, Tabitha looked down at the floor and found a nearby chest resting on top of a piece of broken glass. Curious, she knelt down and opened it. There, she found something in a long purple case, a small crest painted on the lid. "…Staff of Destruction."

"Wait, you found it?" asked Guiche, who'd been poking around the disused hearth. Tabitha pulled it out of the chest and showed it to the group. "Well, that was easy."

"…almost too easy," Lloyd said darkly.

"Hm? What do you mean, Darling?" asked Kirche.

"A powerful magical artifact sitting practically unattended in an unsecured location with no traps in a place multiple people know about? …I don't know about you, but I got a bad feeling about-" Lloyd said. Right as he was about to finish the phrase that never should be said, there was a loud scream from outside. "Louise-!?"

Suddenly, there was a mighty crunch as the roof was smashed right off the hut, and a familiar earth golem rose up from the hole it had made.

 **(BGM: Stand a Chance – The Big O OST)**

"That golem-!" said Guiche.

"Longueville must have been waiting for us," Lloyd said.

Tabitha quickly tucked the Staff of Destruction under her arm and raised her arm. " _Nied Iss Har…Wind!_ " A mighty cyclone erupted from her staff and collided with the golem's face. Nothing happened.

" _In Ex Bet Flame…Fire!_ " Kirche was next, unleashing a stream of flames from her wand that she had kept safe in her cleavage. The golem stepped back and swiped at its massive body with its arm and the flames quickly died out.

"Fly, my Valkyries!" Guiche waved his rose, summoning two Valkyries, although there was barely space in the confined shack for them. And then there was, as they burst through the walls of the shack and tried to attack the golem with their spears. Said spears actually broke against the golem's "skin," and were promptly smashed into the ground with its foot. "That's not good!"

"Definitely not good," agreed Lloyd. As the shack began to creak, now that one of its walls had come down, Lloyd immediately ran outside, drawing Derflinger as he did. "Everyone out!"

The other mages followed suit, scattering left, right, and center. The golem took a swipe at Guiche and Lloyd as they ran past, its fist hitting empty ground as the two artificers dove for cover. Behind them, the shack collapsed under its own weight, falling into a dusty heap of wood.

"Well, this is a fine kettle of fish! What do we do now?" asked Sonya.

"We fight! Fouquet must be nearby, and if we defeat her golem, she will most likely reveal herself!" said Lamarc, drawing his sword.

"Screw that noise! We got what we came here for, let's just go! We're not prepared to fight something of this magnitude!" Lloyd countered.

"Don't you dare presume yourself the master of these situations, Familiar!" snapped Lamarc. He stabbed the ground, summoning a pair of his musketeer constructs. "This is how a true mage fights! Charge, noble warriors!" The musketeers raised their rapiers and charged, their blades thrusting against the skin of the golem. While their weapons did not actually break, they were only marginally more successful, and were sent sprawling by the golem's massive fists.

"Truly inspiring," quipped Lloyd. "Sonya, we need cover!"

"I'm working on it!" Sonya said, dropping a couple of lands of her own. Tabitha, also sensing the need to run, also raised her staff and gave a loud whistle. At once, Sylphid came soaring down from the skies. As the golem tried to swat the dragon out of the air, Sonya produced a card of her own.

" **Lyev Skyknight!** " A knight in white and blue armor shot out of the card, astride a griffon. The knight lifted his spear, and the runic triangles Sonya had applied the day before came down on the golem, holding it in place. "Okay, I've Detained it for the moment! Now what?"

"We get out of here. Tabitha, how many can Sylphid take in the air?" Lloyd asked.

"Four," Tabitha said.

"Good enough. Take Kirche, Louise, and Guiche out of here. Sonya, Lamarc, and I will hold them off!" Lloyd said, producing two more cards. " **Mox Opal! Shrine of the Loyal Legions!** " The swirling magical stone reappeared in Lloyd's hands, and next to him, a large pedestal with a faceless bust on it.

"Sounds great!" Sonya said, dropping another land. "Just one problem!"

Lloyd followed the Azorius user's finger to find that Louise had resolutely taken a stand against the golem, right as the Detain triangles lifted from it. With a wave of her wand, an explosion about the size of a grape rang off the golem's back. The golem slowly turned, its attention now focused on Louise.

"Louise, what the hell are you doing!?" asked Lloyd. Louise faltered slightly, seeing even her failed spell having no effect, but stood her ground, wand raised. "Louise, run, you can't fight the golem like that!"

"I'm not running!" Louise countered. The golem took a giant step forward.

"Louise, if we can't fight it, there's no way you can!"

"I am a noble!" Louise didn't budge, even as the golem took a second step forward. "You don't call someone a noble because they use magic! You call someone a noble because they never turn their back to the enemy! I will not be Louise the Zero forever! Especially like _this!_ _Tiel Nidul Thunder!_ "

The golem raised its fist as Louise shot another spell. This one rang off the golem's chest and had just as little effect as before, and its fist came down to smash a helpless Louise into the ground. Upon finding he lacked the mana to use Safe Passage, Lloyd did the only thing he could: he dashed right into the fray and tackled her out of the way of the golem's fist.

 **(BGM Stops)**

As the humongous dust cloud rose over them both, Louise immediately rounded on her familiar, righteous fury blazing in her eyes. "How dare you-"

She was immediately silenced by Lloyd's open palm meeting her face. After taking a moment to process that her Familiar had risen to actual violence against her, thrice in almost as many days, she looked up at him, touching the dirt that had rubbed against her cheek.

"Do I look like I give two tits in a gravy about you being noble!?" asked Lloyd, his voice a kind of angry she hadn't quite heard before. "If you die, your past and your future disappear in the blink of an eye! There's nothing left! This is a fight to the death! The most important thing is to stay alive-"

"I-I mean…" Lloyd's anger slipped a little as Louise began to tear up. "Everyone makes fun of me…it's so frustrating…it just makes me want to scream…but I can't be a noble if I run away! They'll just tease me more! And what about the Princess? I just can't break my promise to her-"

At that moment, Lloyd remembered just who it was he was dealing with. Behind him, he saw the golem raise its fist for another blow. Lloyd simply produced another card, right as his mana returned. " **Soul Parry!** "

 **(BGM Play: You Say Run – My Hero Academia OST)**

Derflinger suddenly jumped out of its sheath and right into Lloyd's hand, ablaze with white fire as Lloyd's runes shone in the dusty gloom. The golem's fist collided with it, but even as Lloyd's feet dug into the ground from the impact, he stayed standing. "We already got the Staff of Destruction. No one will dispute your honor if we run. I won't allow it. But we have to run now."

Louise gave a start, watching her Familiar struggle against the golem's fist. "Lloyd…!"

"Louise, go! I'll keep him busy!" Lloyd snapped. Louise quickly picked herself up and started running as soon as Sylphid came down to land, with Tabitha and Kirche already on board. "Guiche, you too!"

Guiche, however, had been watching the whole fight play out before him. His grip on his rose tightened briefly before he gave two quick flicks, petals forming into four Valkyries. "Not a chance! I'm staying, too!"

"Brother, this foe is beyond you! You need to leave with the others!" Lamarc shouted.

"You would tell me to run even when Louise the Zero wants to stay and fight?" Guiche said. "Damn Fouquet and damn the Staff of Destruction! No one tells a son of the Gramont to back down from a challenge!"

Lamarc was stunned. His errant playboy brother, in the space of a few hours, had somehow grown up. Rather than question it or suppose it a fluke, Lamarc smiled and stabbed the ground again, summoning four Musketeers. "Now you're starting to sound like a Gramont!"

"Looks like everyone would rather fight than run, Lloyd!" Sonya said as Lloyd disengaged from the golem, Derflinger ready. "That gonna be a problem?"

Lloyd wasn't quite sure what to do at first. Every nerve in his body was telling him to run, but with Louise and Guiche's declarations and even Kirche and Tabitha not taking off with Sylphid and the Staff of Destruction, it was becoming harder to ignore. And so, Lloyd nodded and faced the golem. "Okay then! We stay and fight! Tabitha, get airborne with Louise and Kirche, try to distract it with aerial attacks! We're gonna give everything we got in one combined shot! Got it?"

"Right!"

"Then _let's rock!_ " declared Lloyd, dropping another land. A card then jumped to his hand. " **Tempered Steel!** " Lightning arced across the battlefield, striking Lloyd's Signal Pest from its position up in a tree and even Lamarc and Guiche's golems. "Sonya! Lay him up!"

"You got it! **Soulsworn Spirit!** " Sonya dropped another land and summoned a hooded phantasmal figure, its long arms rising up. With a quick motion, the golem was Detained once more. Their foe now locked down, the group took action. Kirche and Tabitha unleashed wind and fire from Sylphid's back while Louise continued to cast small explosions on the golem whenever she could. Sonya's Skyknight dived down with spear in hand to fight as the Gramont brothers unleashed their golems in a combined attack, spear and sword striking the golem everywhere else as even Lloyd himself and his Signal Pest charged to the fray, the Pest's metallic battle cry echoing across the fray as Lloyd swung away at the golem's legs with Derflinger.

Together, they did even more damage to the golem than before, an arm and a leg falling into the dirt from its body. But even this was not enough, as the earth rose up to replace the limbs, as though nothing had happened.

"Even after all that, it refuses to die…!" Lamarc spat.

" _Sonya herself said that Fouquet is at least Triangle Class! Her golem may be ugly, but its base composition of raw earth means she can easily keep it going by summoning more from its surroundings!_ " said Derflinger.

"So it's like a creature with regeneration, basically!" Lloyd said. "We need something more permanent to beat it! Sonya, you got anything other than simple lockdown!?"

"A couple of things! But I need more mana for them!" Sonya replied.

"Damn, and I'm tapped out, too," grunted Lloyd. "We need more time so I can Dispatch his ass…!"

The golem spread out its arms. A series of stalagmites appeared its body and fired it in all directions, kicking up even more dust that covered the battlefield. One of the stalagmites almost hit Lloyd, taking out the tree behind him, and another struck Sonya's Lyev Skyknight and destroyed it.

"Time is one thing Fouquet will not give us…!" coughed Guiche.

Louise watched the golem raise its fists and smash the ground, sending out a shockwave in all directions, and for a moment, she saw the Gramont brother's constructs flying on the wave before shattering. At this point, running was starting to look like the wiser option, but there was no way Fouquet would just let them run off with her (but technically their) prize. And at that moment, a light bulb went off in her head.

"Give me that, Zerbst!" Louise snatched the Staff of Destruction case right from Kirche's lap.

"Hey!"

"Let me off this thing, Tabitha! Quickly!" Louise ignored her, already getting off the dragon. Tabitha complied, using her staff to summon a gust of wind to let her down gently while also blowing away the dust. As Louise came down to earth, so did the case containing the Staff. It was empty.

"What's going on now?" asked Guiche.

"Up there!" said Sonya, pointing at Louise. Nestled in Louise's arms was a long olive-green object.

"Is that the actual Staff of Destruction?" asked Lloyd. He'd seen that kind of object before. "That can't actually be what I think it is, is it?"

Louise immediately started waving the Staff at the golem, but it had no effect. Lloyd immediately ran towards her, still holding Derflinger. "Guiche! Lamarc! Cover me!"

Lamarc immediately charged into the fray himself, swinging his saber, but the Golem instead swung its arms again, trying to smash the elder Gramont into the ground. However, something got to him first: one of Guiche's Valkyries, one that had managed to survive the shockwave earlier, and it took the blow for him instead.

"Face me, Fouquet!" Guiche declared. "I'll be your opponent!"

Lloyd managed to reach Louise safely, tossing Derflinger into the ground. He then snatched the Staff from her. "Louise!"

"Hey! What on earth are you-!?"

"It's not a magic staff! This is how you use it!" With a swift series of motions Lloyd wasn't quite sure where it came from, Lloyd uncapped it, extended the shaft, brought out a sight on the top, and took aim.

Sonya, watching as Lloyd mounted the weapon on his shoulder, quickly shouted, "Hit the deck!" Both Gramonts ran for cover as she and Louise took cover, covering their heads.

" _Fire in the hole!_ " With a loud cry, Lloyd pressed the button. A rocket shot out of the canister and struck the golem dead in the face, right as it was about to stomp on Louise and Lloyd. The resultant explosion obliterated the golem in a single blast, showering them in debris, but this time, it did not regenerate.

 **(BGM Stops)**

"…did we win?" asked Guiche.

"…I believe so," replied Lamarc.

Lloyd said nothing, too excited from their near-death experience. At the same time, he also looked over at the (not) Staff of Destruction, laying discarded on the ground next to Derflinger. He'd ditched it to protect Louise from the debris, but what was more pressing was why there was such a weapon in a place full of magic anyhow. Then Kirche came barreling out of nowhere, shoving Lloyd's face into her cleavage yet again, and all thoughts vanished.

"He can use a magic staff, and yet he's still a peasant!? You're really my Darling after all!" said Kirche.

"I don't even know what happened…" Lloyd said, too caught up in breasted heaven to see Louise glaring daggers at her rival. "It was all instinct…"

"Where is Fouquet?" asked Tabitha.

"Well, obviously, she must be nearby," said Lamarc. "We should scan the area immediately."

"Well, lucky us, I got just the thing," said Lloyd. He pointed at the **Shrine of the Loyal Legions** he'd summoned earlier. "Myrs! Assemble!" The shrine glowed with white light, and a pair of Myrs rose up in its place. "Fouquet has to be nearby! Track her down before she escapes!" The two Myrs saluted and ran off into the forest.

Right as that was happening, Miss Longueville, looking none the worse for wear, reappeared on the scene, picking up the Staff of Destruction. "Well done, everyone."

"Miss Longueville, where have you been?" asked Louise, unaware of her Familiar suddenly going tense next to her.

"I…" Longueville scratched the back of her head. "I actually got lost in the forest. When I heard all the fighting going on, I immediately ran back here as fast as I could though. But to think you actually defeated Fouquet's golem in battle at such a young age is…inspiring."

"You flatter us, Miss Longueville," said Lloyd, his voice lacking the usual humility that came with the phrase. Instead, it was the hardness of a murder accusation. "…or should I just call you Fouquet and drop the pretense already?"

Everyone stared at Lloyd for a moment in shock, and then stared at Longueville even more as she removed her glasses and undid her hair tie, letting her long green hair fall down into two very distinct churls. "So. You figured it out."

"Wasn't hard," Lloyd replied.

"She's Fouquet?" asked Louise. "And you knew!?"

"I wasn't sure at first," said Lloyd. "But then things kinda started coming together. The main question on my mind was why the Staff was even here. This is a place people in the local township knew about, had no traps set, not even so much as a bar on the door to keep people from poking around. Why would a master thief like Fouquet want to keep a highly-prized magic artifact from the Academy here? It was either one, Fouquet is an idiot, or two, Fouquet had other plans for it. That's when the golem ripped through the roof.

"But then you said you got lost in the forest and ran back here as fast as you could as soon as you heard the fight start. I would think someone who was running on the forest would look like she actually _was_ running through the forest," Lloyd said, pointing at Fouquet's clothes. "But look at you. No mud on your shoes, no tears on your clothes or scratches on your skin from foliage…no, you look like someone who found a hiding place nearby and just watched everything play out. And say what you will about nobles, no teacher at the Academy would just watch as their students flailed against a far more experienced mage in a fight for their lives."

"My, you're quite impressive for a Familiar, able to piece all that together in such a quick amount of time," Fouquet said, aiming the Staff at them. "But you're not nearly as smart as you think you are."

"…there is still something missing, though," Sonya added. Lloyd noticed she'd hidden one of her cards behind her back: **Detention Sphere.** "Why? With the Staff stolen, you knew either the Royal Guard or the Academy would send people to reclaim it. With all the time you had, you could've been halfway to Romalia by now. Why even stick around?"

"Well, that's the thing, you see," Fouquet replied. "Stealing it was all fine and good, but I had no idea how to use the thing. So I figured if the Academy sent people to find it, they'd figure that part out for me. And that paid off splendidly, seeing that the one who figured it out was none other than the legendary Gandalfr."

"The what?" asked Sonya. "Didn't Professor Colbert say something like that about Lloyd?"

"Who is Gandalfr?" asked Louise.

"I'm afraid that's one secret you'll never hear," said Fouquet. "And now, farewell." Fouquet pressed the button. Nothing happened. She pressed it a couple more times, but the rocket launcher did nothing. "Wait, what-?"

"Eeeeeeyeah. About that Staff of Destruction?" asked Lloyd.

" _You're not nearly as smart as you think you are,_ " Derflinger added with a bit of smugness.

" **Detention Sphere!** " A bright ball of light shot out of Sonya's card and swallowed Fouquet whole. She reappeared inside, pounding against the walls of the sphere as the rocket launcher fell to the ground at her feet.

Lloyd picked it up. "Funny thing about this weapon: it's a single-shot weapon. And by the look of that case, that rocket was the only one it came equipped with. This, ladies and gentlemen, is not a magical staff.

"This is an M72 Rocket Launcher. It's a weapon from my world."

* * *

The rest of the trip went rather smoothly. Lloyd and Sonya took the cart and followed the road back to the Academy while Tabitha called directions from above on Sylphid. Once there, Sonya removed Fouquet from the Detention Sphere, and was thusly handed off to the Royal Guard for holding. Professor Colbert was also waiting to take the Staff of Destruction back to the now-repaired vault while the rest reported to Old Man Osmond and Princess Henrietta for debriefing.

"So, with Fouquet in the hands of the Royal Guard and the Staff of Destruction returned to the vault, there should be no consequences, either for the Academy or the Princess. We'll be holding the annual Ball of Frigg, and all four of you will be our guests of honor," Osmond said to Tabitha, Louise, Kirche, and Guiche. "Not to mention there will be a reward from the castle as well."

"Really? A gift from the crown, as well?" asked Kirche.

Louise however, was focused on something else. "Four? Then, Lloyd and Sir Sonya…"

"Well, Sir Sonya, as a member of the Royal Guard, will have her own reward, I'm sure," Osmond said. "Unfortunately, Miss Valliere, as your Familiar is not a noble, there will be no reward for him."

"…I see…" Louise mumbled.

"Fair enough," Lloyd said, though his clenched fist betrayed his real feelings on the matter. "But as long as we're here, there is something I'd like to discuss with you. Privately, if at all possible."

Osmond nodded and dismissed everyone else, leaving Lloyd alone with Osmond and Colbert. While Kirche gushed at Tabitha about what she was going to wear to the ball, Louise couldn't help but look at the closed door behind her. Lloyd had fought just as hard as anyone else, hadn't he? So why should she get all the glory and leave her Familiar with nothing, even after the multiple times he'd saved her life and protected her?

That was how the system worked, she knew. But it still felt wrong. Lloyd was a dog, but even loyal dogs got rewarded _somehow._

"Louise Francoise?" Louise jumped a little, noticing Henrietta and Sonya standing nearby. "Is there something wrong?"

"…Princess? Can I ask you a favor?"

* * *

"I don't know if you picked it up or not," Lloyd began. "But I'm obviously not from this world. And yet somehow, Louise summoned me here, said process brought my cards to life, somehow, and now there's the Staff of Destruction, which is actually a weapon from my world as well. How did a random object from my world end up here? I was under the impression that kind of thing doesn't just _happen_."

"…I see," Osmond said, his gaze turning pensive. "The Staff of Destruction is a memento of a man I once knew. Forty years ago, I was a teacher here at the Academy, and was travelling Tristain on sabbatical, when I accidentally awoke and angered a powerful dragon. Said dragon would've devoured me if it hadn't been for a man, clad in the strangest green clothes I had ever seen, and terribly wounded by something I'd never seen before."

"And this man is…where, exactly?" Lloyd said, hope welling up inside him.

Osmond hung his head. "I took him back to the Academy and cared him as best I could, but his wounds were too great, and he did not last the night. I never even knew his name, but I sought to give him a proper burial for saving my own life. He carried two Staves of Destruction on him, one of which he used to slay the dragon, which is what I buried him with. The other is the one you used during your battle with Fouquet. That one I offered to the castle, and thus kept it safe here in the vault."

Lloyd groaned, kicking the ground. A solid lead, at last, but no means to follow up on it. "Goddammit."

"I wasn't aware the Staff of Destruction had such a history," said Colbert, wiping at his forehead with a handkerchief.

"…as long as we're here," Lloyd added. "Fouquet used a name I'd never heard before. What do you guys know about Gandalfr?"

Colbert and Osmond looked at each other only for a moment. "That's something that we can't discuss with you currently."

"What? Bullshit!" said Lloyd, frustration boiling over. "It's obviously something important. Because she knew it, and you do, too! That was the name you were about to say before we left, but you got cut off!" he pointed at Colbert. "You and Fouquet obviously knew who this Gandalfr is, and what, if any, relationship he has with me. Tell me, because I really hate being kept out of the loop!"

Osmond merely raised his hand. "I assure you, we will tell you when we're certain the rewards outweigh the risks of such a decision. Until then, it would be best if you did not speak of this to anyone, even Miss Valliere. It could bring a lot of attention that even you would not be able to deal with."

Lloyd tried to find another counterargument, but upon finding none, merely swallowed his anger, nodded, thanked them for their time, and left the room.

"We will have to tell him at some point," Colbert said. "If Fouquet knew about Gandalfr, then-"

"We still need to be certain that Miss Valliere is who we think she is. For now, we should merely play it by ear. Otherwise, it could lead to catastrophe. For all of us."

* * *

"This turned out really goddamn peachy," Lloyd ranted, making his way back up to Louise's room. "No reward, no solid leads, and I'm getting the runaround on this whole 'Gandalfr' hooplah! Seriously, they may as well just dip me in honey and stake me to an anthill for all the good I did them."

" _Don't be like that. You did good today, partner!_ _You captured a major thief, bailed out the school and the princess, and got Pinkie a nice reward from the castle! You could do worse!_ " Derf replied.

"Just a little something for the effort, Derf, that's all I'm asking! Seriously, this whole nobility thing can go straight to-" Lloyd began, opening the door. Strangely, Louise was not in her room, and there was an envelope on the table entitled _Lloyd Kreis, Familiar of Louise Francoise LeBlanc de Valliere._ Upon turning it around, he found a wax seal on it. "…realm of Tristain…?"

" _That's the royal seal of Tristain, partner. Better open it, see what's so important._ "

Lloyd found Louise's letter opener and sliced the envelope open. There, written in the best calligraphy he'd seen yet, was a message.

 _At the request of Princess Henrietta Anne Stuart du Tristain,_

 _You are hereby invited to the annual Ball of Frigg as her esteemed guest_

" _Well, look at you, going places all of a sudden,_ " cracked Derf.

Lloyd chuckled. Either Henrietta decided to take pity on him or Sonya managed to work something out with her.

* * *

The Ball of Frigg, traditionally marking the end of the Familiar Exhibition Festival, was held in the ballroom of the Academy, and already the place was abuzz following the Familiar Exhibition Festival and the tale of the Staff of Destruction's retrieval. Kirche, dressed in a revealing blue gown, was already entertaining her usual round of gentleman callers, and on the other side, Guiche was doing the same for his female callers, at least until Montmorency dragged him away by his ear. Tabitha had merely found a wall next to the food.

Lloyd, dressed in another one of his new coats, a black, red, and white one with the mark of the Mardu, made his way towards the entry of the ballroom, way more nervous than he thought he would be. What's more, he didn't have Derf on his back, and Louise hadn't arrived yet. Suddenly, he saw a handful of knights take up positions around the room, and there…

Oh.

Henrietta had arrived with Lamarc and Sonya, dressed in a stunning lavender dress, her hair in a bun and her tiara resting neatly on her head. Even Sonya had come dressed to the nines in a red gown, in contrast to her white and blue deck. Almost immediately, Lloyd's hands became sweaty in their gloves and his mouth went dry, but he still tried to play it cool as he bowed. "Your Highness."

Henrietta did a small curtsy in response, before turning to Lamarc and Sonya. "Thank you. You may leave us now." The two knights nodded, making their way past Lloyd into the ballroom. Noticing how silent Lloyd was, she merely smiled and asked, "Nothing clever to say, ser Familiar?"

"…um, you look wonderful, I suppose," said Lloyd, dearly wishing Derf was there to put his focus on something else.

Henrietta laughed. "Seems you're not quite so adept with women as you are with magic."

"It's a skill I've yet to acquire," Lloyd said. "Shall we?"

Henrietta and Lloyd followed Lamarc and Sonya's path up the stairs. At the top, a man proclaimed in a loud voice, "Presenting the Vice-Captain of the Griffon Knight Corps, Lamarc de Gramont, and the Enforcer of the Crown, Sir Sonya Franklin!" as the two knights made their way into the room.

"If you don't mind me asking, Your Highness," Lloyd said. "How did you and Sonya meet?"

"It's the strangest thing," Henrietta said. "The Royal Guard found her unconscious outside the gate a couple of weeks ago. Many people assumed she was a spy, due to her strange garb, or a foreign saboteur, but I convinced Captain Gramont to let me speak with her. Quite frankly, she was too scared to be a spy, as far as I was concerned, so she became one of my handmaidens. A short while later, there was an incident at the castle, and that when she used her magic for the first time. So we decided to train her as a knight in the hopes of harnessing her abilities."

"Presenting Her Highness, Princess Henrietta Anne Stuart du Tristain, and guest!"

 _Guest. Of course._ And it only appeared to get worse for Lloyd as he walked into the room, and he seemed to be catching more than a few jealous glares due to who he was accompanying. But Henrietta merely led him on, her smile not disappearing at all as she nodded at the men who greeted her while probably wishing they were in Lloyd's position at the moment. The lights suddenly dimmed, and a waltz immediately began to play.

"May I have this dance?" Henrietta asked, extending her hand.

Lloyd hesitated for a moment, but seeing that everyone else had paired off, he slowly took it. "Of course." Henrietta guided his hands into position and the two of them began to shuffle back in forth, and thus Lloyd was back in that position of wishing someone or something would break the awkward silence that fell between them. Then, he decided to ask another question. "What made you decide to invite me? Sure, I was mad I wasn't getting a reward, but to be the guest of royalty is…"

"Actually, Louise asked me," Henrietta asked.

"…what?" Lloyd blinked.

"She said it didn't feel right that your hard work from this afternoon went unrewarded, not to mention the fact that you saved my life in Fouquet's attack from yesterday. So, she asked me if there was something I could do, and Sir Sonya suggested I invite you to the ball as my guest."

"And you're not worried that someone would get mad that they got snubbed for a peasant Familiar?"

"Why? Were you hoping that someone could try to use this opportunity to woo me?"

"N-no, hardly-!" Lloyd turned dark red. "I mean, who wouldn't-?"

"Well, they'd surely disappointed. My heart is elsewhere, I'm afraid," Henrietta closed her eyes, lost in thought.

Lloyd was indeed disappointed, but he looked away, hoping not to be too overt. "I-is that right?"

The waltz ended, and the couples promptly separated before moving down the line. Henrietta, however, took an extra moment to quickly rise up onto her toes and kiss her partner on the forehead. "Thank you for the dance, Sir Familiar." Then, she moved down the way, and was replaced by none other than Louise, wearing a halter-top pink dress with frills with a gold necklace, and, for some reason, a resigned expression on her face.

"Oh. Louise. What's with the sour look?" Lloyd asked, still dazed from Henrietta's kiss.

The music began again. Louise extended her hand, much like Henrietta, and she said, "I wouldn't mind dancing with you."

Lloyd blinked, and then said, "I'm sure you wouldn't, but there is a phrase for that."

Louise's cheeks turned pink. "…fine, but only today." She then did a small curtsy. "Would you honor me with a song's worth of dance, gentleman?"

… _it's a start,_ Lloyd's mind snarked, but what caught his attention was the fact that Louise was actually smiling when she said it. Such a warm smile was strange, but oddly satisfying to see."Of course."

Lloyd took Louise's hands and they started another waltz. "You know…I'll believe that you came from another world."

"What, you didn't until now?" Lloyd asked.

"Well, I had my doubts. But seeing as you understood the nature of the Staff of Destruction as that 'rocket launcher' you described before, I couldn't think of a reason not to believe you."

"…fair enough."

"…do you…want to go back?" Louise asked. The question sounded forced.

"One day, maybe," Lloyd shrugged. "But for the time being, I'm content to stay. I kinda feel like I've got some business here I need to take care of, first."

"That makes sense," Louise said, looking away. "…also, I wanted to thank you."

"What is with you being so cordial, all of a sudden?"

"You did save me from being crushed by Fouquet's golem," Louise explained, turning redder by the moment. "So…that's what the thank you is for…"

"Well of course I did," Lloyd said. "I'm your Familiar, aren't I? We gotta look out for each other."

Louise beamed, this time not out of smug self-satisfaction or superiority, but instead out of pure happiness. Then the song ended, and a familiar cry rang out across the dance floor. "Darling…!"

"Zerbst!" Louise went right back into angry mode.

Lloyd groaned, kneading his forehead. "Knew it. Should've declined and stayed in bed."


End file.
